silhouette
noun · verb
Simple meaning
An outline of a solid object.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
sihluhwehtSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
sɪləˈwɛt
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
An outline of a solid object (as cast by its shadow)
A drawing of the outline of an object; filled in with some uniform color
fashion
The outline of a garment as it appears on the wearer.
verb
To represent by a silhouette; to project upon a background, so as to be like a silhouette.
Project on a background, such as a screen, like a silhouette
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- C1 · Advanced
- Frequency
- Moderately Common
- Typical Use
- Neutral / general English
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: An outline of a solid object (as cast by its shadow)
Used this way, silhouette 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 silhouette
- “I could see a silhouette of a figure looking out from the window, but I couldn't tell if it was a man or a woman.”noun
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
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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.