oversea
adjective
Simple meaning
Beyond or across the sea.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
ohverseeSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
oʊvɚˈsi
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
chiefly british
Abroad, especially across the sea.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- C2 · Proficient (estimated)
- Frequency
- Rare
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: Abroad, especially across the sea.
Used this way, oversea is a word tied to one variety of English that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. Most speakers understand it but seldom reach for it.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Regional
- Connotation
- No strong connotation
- Usage feel
- Uncommon in everyday speech
Usage note
Mainly used in British English, so it may read as unusual elsewhere.
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
More ways to use oversea
- “He lived overseas for many years.”adverb
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Inflected forms
Grammatical variations of the same word.
Beyond or across the sea.
Compound terms
Established multiword terms.
A wedge-shaped wool or cotton cap.
A telegram sent abroad.
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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.