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ostensible

adjective

Simple meaning

Appearing as such.

Pronunciation

Say it like this:

ahstehnsuhbuhl

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US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

ɑsˈtɛnsəbəl

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. Appearing as such; being such in appearance; professed, supposed (rather than demonstrably true or real).

  2. Apparent, evident; meant for open display.

Word Aura™

How this word commonly comes across.

Aura for this meaning

This meaning: Appearing as such; being such in appearance; professed, supposed (rather than demonstrably true or real).

Used this way, ostensible 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.

ostensible purposeostensible reasonostensible objectostensible subjectostensible authorityostensible groundostensible motiveostensible agency

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More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin

Synonyms

Sense: appearing as such

apparentsuperficialseemingostensivecounterfeit

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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.