shining
adjective · noun
Simple meaning
Having a high polish or sheen.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
shyningSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈʃaɪnɪŋ
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
Having a high polish or sheen.
Emitting light.
Reflecting light.
Having exceptional merit.
noun
A bright emission of light; a gleam.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- B2 · Upper Intermediate (estimated)
- Frequency
- Moderately Common
- Typical Use
- Neutral / general English
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: Having a high polish or sheen.
Used this way, shining 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
- No strong connotation
- Usage feel
- Neutral and straightforward
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.
Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Inflected forms
Grammatical variations of the same word.
Be bright by reflecting or casting light.
The front part of the human leg between the knee and the ankle.
Word family
Words built from the same root.
A swollen bruise caused by a blow to the eye.
Having a shiny surface or coating.
Compound terms
Established multiword terms.
Common North American shrub with shiny lanceolate leaves.
A variety of club moss.
A terrorist group formed in Peru in the late 1960s as a splinter group from the communist party of Peru.
Common nonpoisonous shrub of eastern North America with compound leaves and green paniculate flowers followed by red berries.
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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.