navigate
verb
Simple meaning
To plan, control and record the position and course of a vehicle, ship, aircraft, etc., on a journey.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
navuhgaytSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈnævəɡeɪt
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.
verb
Travel on water propelled by wind or by other means
intransitive
To travel over water in a ship; to sail.
transitive
To plan, control and record the position and course of a vehicle, ship, aircraft, etc., on a journey; to follow a planned course.
intransitive
To give directions, as from a map, to someone driving a vehicle.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- B1 · Intermediate
- Frequency
- Common
- Typical Use
- Everyday English
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: To plan, control and record the position and course of a vehicle, ship, aircraft, etc., on a journey; to follow a planned course.
Used this way, navigate 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 navigate
- “Is anyone volunteering to navigate during the trip?”verb
- “He navigated his way to the altar.”verb
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
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Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Word family
Words built from the same root.
The ship's officer in charge of navigation.
More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin
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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.