fate
noun · verb
Simple meaning
The presumed cause, force, principle, or divine will that predetermines events.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
faytIPA pronunciation (US)
ˈfeɪt
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
The presumed cause, force, principle, or divine will that predetermines events.
The effect, consequence, outcome, or inevitable events predetermined by this cause.
An event or a situation which is inevitable in the fullness of time.
A personification of fate (the cause that predetermines events).
Destiny; often with a connotation of death, ruin, misfortune, etc.
Any one of the Fates.
verb
transitive
To foreordain or predetermine, to make inevitable.
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: The presumed cause, force, principle, or divine will that predetermines events.
Used this way, fate is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It turns up most in ethics or values contexts.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Matter-of-fact
- Usage feel
- Neutral and straightforward
Where it naturally appears
- Ethics/values
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
More ways to use fate
- “It was fate that brought the two strangers together that evening.”noun
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More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin
Synonyms
Sense: presumed cause or force or principle
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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.