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cede

verb

Simple meaning

Give over; surrender or relinquish to the physical control of another.

Pronunciation

Say it like this:

seed
US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

ˈsid

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.

verb

  1. Give over; surrender or relinquish to the physical control of another

  2. transitive

    To give up; yield to another. [with to]

  3. intransitive

    To give way.

  4. ditransitive

    Same as above. [with dative]

Word at a Glance

Difficulty
C2 · Proficient (estimated)
Frequency
Rare

Word Aura™

How this word commonly comes across.

Aura for this meaning

This meaning: Give over; surrender or relinquish to the physical control of another

Used this way, cede 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
No strong connotation
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 cede

  • “Edward decided to cede the province.”verb

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Common Patterns and Combinations

How this word naturally appears with others.

Give / relinquish

cede controlcede power

Other combinations

cede territorycede landhereby cede

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Similar Words, What’s the Difference?

Close in meaning, but not always interchangeable.

  • give up

    To relinquish (something).

  • yield

    To give up; to surrender or capitulate.

  • deliver

    To hand over or surrender (someone or something) to another.

  • surrender

    To give up into the power, control, or possession of another.

More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin

Synonyms

Sense: give over

surrenderyielddeliverconcede

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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.