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routine

noun · adjective

Simple meaning

A course of action to be followed regularly.

Pronunciation

Say it like this:

rooteen

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US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

ɹuˈtin

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.

noun

  1. A course of action to be followed regularly; a standard procedure.

  2. A set of normal procedures, often performed mechanically.

  3. A set piece of an entertainer's act.

adjective

  1. Regular; habitual.

  2. According to established procedure.

  3. Ordinary with nothing to distinguish it from all the others.

Word at a Glance

Difficulty
B1 · Intermediate
Frequency
Common
Typical Use
Everyday English

Word Aura™

How this word commonly comes across.

Aura for this meaning

This meaning: A set of normal procedures, often performed mechanically.

Used this way, routine 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
Matter-of-fact
Usage feel
Neutral and straightforward

Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.

More ways to use routine

  • “Connie was completely robotic and emotionless by age 12; her entire life had become one big routine.”noun

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Common Patterns and Combinations

How this word naturally appears with others.

Course

usual routineroutine procedure

Other combinations

routine workroutine useroutine maintenanceroutine basisroutine practice

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Word Family

Related forms, grouped by how they connect.

Word family

Words built from the same root.

  • routinelyadverbDerived adverb

    According to routine or established practice.

Compound terms

Established multiword terms.

  • library routinenounCompound term

    A debugged routine that is maintained in a program library.

  • output routinenounCompound term

    A routine that controls an output device.

  • recursive routinenounCompound term

    A routine that can call itself.

  • reusable routinenounCompound term

    A routine that can be loaded once and executed repeatedly.

  • service routinenounCompound term

    A routine that can be used as needed.

  • supervisory routinenounCompound term

    A routine that coordinates the operation of subroutines.

More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin

Synonyms

noun

Sense: course of action to be followed regularly

ordinaryregular

adjective

Sense: regular

ordinaryTechnical

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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.