birth
noun · verb · adjective
Simple meaning
The process of childbearing.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
burthIPA pronunciation (US)
ˈbɝθ
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
uncountable
The process of childbearing; the beginning of life; the emergence of a human baby or other viviparous animal offspring from the mother's body into the environment.
countable
An instance of childbirth.
countable
A beginning or start; a point of origin.
A baby born; an offspring
“The overall rate of incidence of Down's syndrome is one in every 800 births.”
uncountable
The circumstances of one's background, ancestry, or upbringing.
The event of being born
“They celebrated the birth of their first child.”
verb
transitivefiguratively
To produce, give rise to.
transitive
To bear or give birth to (a child).
adjective
A familial relationship established by childbirth.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- A2 · Elementary
- Frequency
- Common
- Typical Use
- Everyday English
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: The process of childbearing; the beginning of life; the emergence of a human baby or other viviparous animal offspring from the mother's body into the environment.
Used this way, birth 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.
How It’s Used
The word’s distinct uses, one example each.
Childbearing / babynoun
“The overall rate of incidence of Down's syndrome is one in every 800 births.”
Eventnoun
“They celebrated the birth of their first child.”
More ways to use birth
- “They celebrated the birth of their first child.”noun
- “The overall rate of incidence of Down's syndrome is one in every 800 births.”noun
- “They divorced after the birth of the child.”noun
Share your sentence
Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Inflected forms
Grammatical variations of the same word.
The process of giving birth.
Compound terms
Established multiword terms.
A social reformer who advocates birth control and family planning.
A defect that is present at birth.
A regularly recurrent spasm of pain that is characteristic of childbirth.
Limiting the number of children born.
The ratio of live births in an area to the population of that area.
Physical injury to an infant during the birth process.
Related words
Connected by subject or meaning, not by word formation.
A right or privilege that you are entitled to at birth.
A party held on the anniversary of someone's birth.
Related Words
Connected to the same idea, not synonyms.
More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin
Synonyms
Use This Word
See how this word sounds in a real sentence.
Ask Vocabaura
Understand the word your way.
What Does It Mean Here?
Words can change meaning depending on context.
Use it yourself
Knowing “birth” starts when you use it. Pick a next step, all free.
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.