purple
noun · adjective · verb
Simple meaning
The color between red and blue.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
purpuhlSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈpɝpəl
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.
noun
The color between red and blue.
colour theory
A colour between red and blue; violet, though often closer to magenta.
colour theory
Any non-spectral colour on the line of purples on a colour chromaticity diagram or a colour wheel between violet and red.
Cloth, or a garment, dyed a purple colour; especially, a purple robe, worn as an emblem of rank or authority; specifically, the purple robe or mantle worn by Ancient Roman emperors as the emblem of imperial dignity.
The purple haze cultivar of cannabis in the kush family, either pure or mixed with others, or by extension any variety of smoked marijuana.
Any of various species of mollusks from which Tyrian purple dye was obtained, especially the common dog whelk.
adjective
Imperial; regal.
Blood-red; bloody.
Of a purple hue.
verb
Color purple
intransitive
To turn purple in colour.
Become purple
transitive
To dye purple.
transitive
To clothe in purple.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- A2 · Elementary (estimated)
- Frequency
- Common
- Typical Use
- Everyday English
More ways to use purple
- “He was born to the purple.”noun
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Compound terms
Established multiword terms.
Tall showy tropical American annual having hairy stems and long spikes of usually red flowers above leaves deeply flushed with purple.
Small shrubby tree with purple flowers.
Small hybrid apricot of Asia and Asia Minor having purplish twigs and white flowers following by inferior purple fruit.
North American perennial with hairy basal pinnate leaves and purple flowers and plume-tipped fruits.
Free-living Gram-negative pink to purplish-brown bacteria containing bacteriochlorophyll.
Variety of European beech with shining purple or copper-colored leaves.
Related words
Connected by subject or meaning, not by word formation.
A shade of blue tinged with purple.
A red with a tinge of purple.
Related Words
Connected to the same idea, not synonyms.
More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin
Synonyms
Sense: color between red and blue
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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.