eye
noun · verb
Simple meaning
An organ through which animals see.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
eyeIPA pronunciation (US)
ˈaɪ
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
An organ through which animals see ("perceive surroundings via light").
The organ of sight
Attention to what is seen
“He tried to catch her eye.”
The iris of the eye, being of a specified colour.
The visual sense.
Attention, notice.
verb
transitive
To remove the reproductive buds from (potatoes).
transitive
To allow (fish eggs) to develop so that the black eye spots are visible.
transitive
To carefully or appraisingly observe (someone or something).
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- A2 · Elementary
- Frequency
- Very Common
- Typical Use
- Everyday English
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: An organ through which animals see ("perceive surroundings via light").
Used this way, eye 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.
More ways to use eye
- “He tried to catch her eye.”noun
- “She has an eye for fresh talent.”noun
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Common Patterns and Combinations
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Related Words
Connected to the same idea, not synonyms.
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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.