altered

adjective

al·​tered ˈȯl-tərd 

1

: made different in some way

… she addressed me again, speaking in very altered tones; so altered, that I hardly recognised them as hers.

—Wilkie Collins

… no great change had taken place inside him, but his exterior was visibly altered.

—Booth Tarkington

2

: castrated sense 1a

I've noticed that my altered cats and my older cats have more dandruff than the unaltered and younger ones.

—Susie Page

Examples of altered in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Together, the altered magnetite and crystalline hematite provide new evidence that water played an important role in reshaping the planet's surface. — Samantha Mathewson, Space.com, 4 Aug. 2026

He was also known to cheat at dice sometimes, by playing with altered dice. — Jenisha Watts, The Atlantic, 2 Aug. 2026

Renner was referring to the allegation the National Institute of Health helped fund gain of function research, which tests how altered viruses act in the real world, at a lab in Wuhan, the Chinese city that saw the first outbreak of COVID-19. — Gray Rohrer, Miami Herald, 31 July 2026

Indeed, Google’s SynthID was unable to provide any image verification when Ars used a smartphone camera to take a photo of an AI-altered image made using the Google Earth feature. — Jeremy Hsu, ArsTechnica, 31 July 2026

Word History

Etymology

from past participle of alter

First Known Use

1563, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Rhymes for altered

• unaltered
• faltered