inattentive
adjective
Simple meaning
Showing a lack of attention or care.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
ihnuhtehntivSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ɪnəˈtɛntɪv
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.
adjective
Showing a lack of attention or care
Of or pertaining to a lack of attention; not paying attention; careless.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- C2 · Proficient (estimated)
- Frequency
- Rare
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
This meaning: Showing a lack of attention or care
Used this way, inattentive 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
Nearby words
- unheeding , rarer, so it draws attention
- absentminded , rarer, so it draws attention
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
More ways to use inattentive
- “Inattentive students.”adjective
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin
Synonyms
Sense: showing a lack of attention or care
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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.