chevron
noun · verb
Simple meaning
V-shaped sleeve badge indicating military rank and service.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
shehvruhnSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈʃɛvɹən
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
V-shaped sleeve badge indicating military rank and service
A V-shaped pattern; used in architecture, and as an insignia of military or police rank, on the sleeve.
chiefly british
One of the V-shaped markings on the surface of roads used to indicate minimum distances between vehicles.
heraldry
A wide inverted V placed on a shield.
An inverted V-shaped charge
A guillemet, either of the punctuation marks "«" or "»", used in several languages to indicate passages of speech. Similar to typical quotation marks used in the English language such as """ and """.
verb
To form or be formed into chevrons
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- C1 · Advanced (estimated)
- Frequency
- Uncommon
- Typical Use
- Neutral / general English
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: V-shaped sleeve badge indicating military rank and service
Used this way, chevron is a specialist word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. This is a military use: it belongs to service and operational language.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Specialist/technical
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Specialized
- Connotation
- Clinical and technical
- Usage feel
- Technical and specialized
Where it naturally appears
- Military
- Historical writing
- News/reporting
- Technical/specialist writing
Usage note
In general conversation this sense usually needs explaining — outside its field, people reach for a plainer word.
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
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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.