desist
verb
Simple meaning
To cease to proceed or act.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
dihsistSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
dɪˈsɪst
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.
verb
ambitransitiveformal
To cease to proceed or act; to stop (often with from).
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- C2 · Proficient (estimated)
- Frequency
- Uncommon
- Typical Use
- Primarily written
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: (ambitransitive, formal) To cease to proceed or act; to stop (often with from).
Used this way, desist is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It turns up most in academic writing contexts.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Formal
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- No strong connotation
- Usage feel
- Formal and precise
Where it naturally appears
- Academic writing
Usage note
Comfortable in writing and prepared speech; in casual conversation a shorter everyday word usually sounds more natural.
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.
Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Compound terms
Established multiword terms.
A judicial remedy issued in order to prohibit a party from doing or continuing to do a certain activity.
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What Does It Mean Here?
Words can change meaning depending on context.
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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.