recruit
verb · noun
Simple meaning
Cause to assemble or enlist in the military.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
ruhkrootSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ɹəkˈɹut
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
Cause to assemble or enlist in the military
To enroll or enlist new members or potential employees on behalf of an employer, organization, sports team, the military, etc.
To supply with new men, as an army; to fill up or make up by enlistment; also, to muster
noun
A person enlisted for service in the army; a newly enlisted soldier.
A supply of anything wasted or exhausted; a reinforcement.
A hired worker
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- B2 · Upper Intermediate
- Frequency
- Moderately Common
- Typical Use
- Neutral / general English
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: A person enlisted for service in the army; a newly enlisted soldier.
Used this way, recruit is a specialist word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. This is a military use: it belongs to service and operational language.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Specialist/technical
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Specialized
- Connotation
- Clinical and technical
- Usage feel
- Technical and specialized
Where it naturally appears
- Military
- Historical writing
- News/reporting
- Technical/specialist writing
Usage note
In general conversation this sense usually needs explaining — outside its field, people reach for a plainer word.
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
More ways to use recruit
- “The party recruited many new members.”verb
- “The lab director recruited an able crew of assistants.”verb
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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.
Someone who supplies members or employees.
Compound terms
Established multiword terms.
A sergeant deputized to enlist recruits.
A recently enlisted soldier.
An inexperienced and untrained recruit.
Related Words
Connected to the same idea, not synonyms.
- recruitmentnoun
- platoonnoun
- battalionnoun
- committedadjective
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.