repentant
adjective · noun
Simple meaning
Feeling or showing sorrow for wrongdoing.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
rihpehntuhntSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ɹɪˈpɛntənt
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
Feeling or showing sorrow for wrongdoing.
noun
One who repents; a penitent.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- C2 · Proficient (estimated)
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: Feeling or showing sorrow for wrongdoing.
Used this way, repentant is a reasonably familiar word with a clearly unfavourable pull. It sounds natural in ordinary conversation and in expressive writing alike.
- Emotional tone
- Negative
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Moderate
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Serious and weighty
- Usage feel
- Everyday but emotionally strong
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.
Similar Words, What’s the Difference?
Close in meaning, but not always interchangeable.
Sincerely penitent or feeling regret or sorrow, especially for one's own actions.
Feeling pain or sorrow on account of one's sins or offenses.
Causing, feeling, or expressing regret or sorrow, especially in a wry or humorous way.
Feeling or expressing regret or sorrow or a sense of loss over something done or undone.
More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin
Synonyms
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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.