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hibernate

verb

Simple meaning

Be in an inactive or dormant state.

Pronunciation

Say it like this:

hybernayt

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US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

ˈhaɪbɚneɪt

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.

verb

  1. Be in an inactive or dormant state

  2. intransitivecomputing

    To enter a standby state which conserves power without losing the contents of memory.

  3. intransitive

    To live in seclusion.

Word at a Glance

Difficulty
C1 · Advanced
Frequency
Uncommon

Word Aura™

How this word commonly comes across.

Aura for this meaning

This meaning: Be in an inactive or dormant state

Used this way, hibernate 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 hibernate

  • “Bears must eat a lot of food before they hibernate in their caves.”verb

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Common Patterns and Combinations

How this word naturally appears with others.

hibernate throughusing hibernatespecies hibernatehibernate modehibernate sessionhibernate configurationhibernate mapping

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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.