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golden

adjective · verb · noun

Simple meaning

Having a color or other richness suggestive of gold.

Pronunciation

Say it like this:

gohlduhn

Say the bold part a little louder.

US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

ˈɡoʊldən

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. Having a color or other richness suggestive of gold.

  2. Made of, or relating to, gold.

  3. Marked by prosperity, creativity etc.

  4. Advantageous or very favourable.

  5. Relating to the elderly or retired.

  6. Of a beverage, flavoured or colored with turmeric.

verb

  1. intransitive

    To become gold or golden (in color).

  2. transitive

    To make golden or like gold.

noun

  1. A number of places in the United States

  2. A home rule municipality, the county seat of Jefferson County, Colorado.

  3. A ghost town in Burt County, Nebraska.

  4. A ghost town and census-designated place in Santa Fe County, New Mexico.

  5. A ghost town in Josephine County, Oregon.

  6. A ghost town in Box Elder County, Utah.

Word Aura™

How this word commonly comes across.

Aura for this meaning

This meaning: Having a color or other richness suggestive of gold.

Used this way, golden 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.

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Common Patterns and Combinations

How this word naturally appears with others.

golden hairgolden boughgolden daysgolden bowl

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Word Family

Related forms, grouped by how they connect.

Compound terms

Established multiword terms.

  • golden-beard penstemonnounCompound term

    Plant of southwestern United States having long open clusters of scarlet flowers with yellow hairs on lower lip.

  • golden-crested kingletnounCompound term

    European kinglet with a black-bordered yellow crown patch.

  • golden-eyed flynounCompound term

    A variety of green lacewing.

  • golden agenounCompound term

    A time period when some activity or skill was at its peak.

  • golden agernounCompound term

    An elderly person.

  • golden algaenounCompound term

    Algae having the pigments chlorophyll and carotene and xanthophyll.

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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.