underlying
adjective
Simple meaning
Basic or fundamental.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
uhnderlyingSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
əndɚˈlaɪɪŋ
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
Basic or fundamental
literal
Lying underneath
Implicit
Word Aura™
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More ways to use underlying
- “Many nursery rhymes have an underlying meaning.”adjective
- “Points and straight lines are underlying elements of geometry.”adjective
- “We dug down to the underlying rock.”adjective
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Common Patterns and Combinations
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Basic
Entity
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More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin
Synonyms
Sense: basic or fundamental
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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.