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attractive

adjective

Simple meaning

Pleasing or appealing to the senses.

Pronunciation

Say it like this:

uhtraktiv

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US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

ətˈɹæktɪv

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.

Word Review

Definition

Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.

adjective

  1. Pleasing or appealing to the senses, especially of a potential romantic partner.

  2. Having the power of charming or alluring by agreeable qualities; enticing.

  3. Causing attraction; having the quality of attracting by inherent force.

Word at a Glance

Difficulty
B1 · Intermediate
Frequency
Common
Typical Use
Everyday English

Word Aura™

How this word commonly comes across.

Aura for this meaning

This meaning: Pleasing or appealing to the senses, especially of a potential romantic partner.

Used this way, attractive is a reasonably familiar word with a mildly favourable edge. It turns up most in relationships contexts.

Emotional tone
Slightly positive
Formality
Neutral
Intensity
Moderate
How common
Moderately common
Connotation
Positive and appreciative
Usage feel
Neutral and straightforward

Where it naturally appears

  • Relationships

Nearby words

  • prepossessing , rarer, so it draws attention

Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.

More ways to use attractive

  • “A remarkably attractive young man.”adjective

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Common Patterns and Combinations

How this word naturally appears with others.

attractive forceattractive featureless attractiveparticularly attractiveattractive womanespecially attractiveattractive alternativeattractive appearance

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Word Family

Related forms, grouped by how they connect.

Word family

Words built from the same root.

  • attractornounPerson or profession

    An entertainer who attracts large audiences.

  • attractivelyadverbDerived adverb

    In a beautiful manner.

Compound terms

Established multiword terms.

  • attractive forcenounCompound term

    The force by which one object attracts another.

  • attractive nuisancenounCompound term

    Anything on your premises that might attract children into danger or harm.

  • attractive featurenounCompound term

    A characteristic that provides pleasure and attracts.

Related words

Connected by subject or meaning, not by word formation.

More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin

Synonyms

Sense: pleasing or appealing to the senses

magneticprepossessingRare

Antonyms

Sense: pleasing or appealing to the senses

unattractive

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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.