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coastal

adjective · noun

Simple meaning

Near or beside the sea.

Pronunciation

Say it like this:

kohstuhl

Say the bold part a little louder.

US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

ˈkoʊstəl

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. geography

    Relating to the coast; on or near the coast; longshore.

  2. geography

    Located on or near or bordering on a coast

noun

  1. informal

    Coastal Carolina University.

Word at a Glance

Difficulty
A2 · Elementary (estimated)
Frequency
Common
Typical Use
Everyday English

Word Aura™

How this word commonly comes across.

Aura for this meaning

This meaning: (geography) Relating to the coast; on or near the coast; longshore.

Used this way, coastal 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 coastal

  • “We took a scenic drive along the beautiful coastal highway.”

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Common Patterns and Combinations

How this word naturally appears with others.

coastal statecoastal zonecoastal areacoastal regioncoastal stripcoastal tradecoastal managementcoastal engineering

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Word Family

Related forms, grouped by how they connect.

Word family

Words built from the same root.

  • coasternounPerson or profession

    A resident of a coastal area.

Compound terms

Established multiword terms.

  • coastal diving birdnounCompound term

    Gull family.

  • coastal plainnounCompound term

    A plain adjacent to a coast.

  • coastal rein orchidnounCompound term

    Stout orchid of central California to northern Washington having racemes of white fragrant bilaterally symmetrical flowers.

Related words

Connected by subject or meaning, not by word formation.

  • coastguardnounRelated term

    A military service responsible for the safety of maritime traffic in coastal waters.

  • coast redwoodnounRelated term

    Lofty evergreen of United States coastal foothills from Oregon to Big Sur.

  • coast live oaknounRelated term

    Highly variable often shrubby evergreen oak of coastal zone of western North America having small thick usually spiny-toothed dark-green leaves.

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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.