annihilation
noun
Simple meaning
Destroying or otherwise turning into nothing.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
uhnyuhlayshuhnSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ənaɪəˈleɪʃən
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
noun
The act of destroying or otherwise turning into nothing, or nonexistence.
The act of destroying the form or combination of parts under which a thing exists, so that the name can no longer be applied to it.
The state of being annihilated.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- B2 · Upper Intermediate (estimated)
- Frequency
- Uncommon
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: The act of destroying or otherwise turning into nothing, or nonexistence.
Used this way, annihilation is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It usually sounds natural in a wide range of settings.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Matter-of-fact
- Usage feel
- Neutral and straightforward
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
More ways to use annihilation
- “Bomb tests resulted in the annihilation of the atoll.”noun
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Compound terms
Established multiword terms.
The act of killing yourself.
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.