biennial

adjective bi·en·ni·al \ (ˌ)bī-ˈe-nē-əl \

|Updated on: 14 Jul 2018

Usage guide: What do bimonthly and biweekly mean?

Definition of biennial

1 : occurring every two years

a biennial celebration

2 : continuing or lasting for two years; specifically, of a plant : growing vegetatively during the first year and fruiting and dying during the second

Biennial herbs flower in their second year.

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biennial

noun

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biennially

play \-ə-lē\ adverb

See biennial defined for English-language learners

See biennial defined for kids

What do bimonthly and biweekly mean?

Many people are puzzled about bimonthly and biweekly, which are often ambiguous because they are formed from two different senses of bi-: "occurring every two" and "occurring two times." This ambiguity has been in existence for nearly a century and a half and cannot be eliminated by the dictionary. The chief difficulty is that many users of these words assume that others know exactly what they mean, and they do not bother to make their context clear. So if you need bimonthly or biweekly, you should leave some clues in your context to the sense of bi- you mean. And if you need the meaning "twice a," you can substitute semi- for bi-. Biannual and biennial are usually differentiated.

Examples of biennial in a Sentence

The governor explained the biennial budget proposal.

Recent Examples of biennial from the Web

But the biennial ice exercise known as ICEX is needed to maintain the Navy’s readiness in the ocean that’s about half bordered by Russia.

— frank vaisvilas, Lake County News-Sun, "From Grayslake to the North Pole: Lake County native describes service aboard submarine," 7 June 2018
The Wall Street Journal reported last week that Mr. Mattis, after weeks of internal deliberation, concluded that China shouldn’t be allowed to participate in the biennial exercise, also known as Rimpac.

— nancy a. youssef, WSJ, "Mattis Says China Is ‘Out of Step’ With International Law," 29 May 2018
The biennial exercise is organized by U.S. Pacific Command and involves naval forces from multiple Asian countries.

— david s. cloud, latimes.com, "Pentagon bars China from joining naval exercise in the Pacific," 23 May 2018
This weekend marks their seventh biennial staff-curated show.

— nikki delamotte, cleveland.com, "Get a look into K&P Photo's 18,000-square-foot Cleveland space at biennial art show (photos)," 25 Apr. 2018
Terrain eventually expanded to include a neighborhood-wide biennial that began in 2013, commingling Midwestern artists with those from around the world.

— kt hawbaker, chicagotribune.com, "Sabina Ott, 'Artist Mother of Chicago,' dies at 62," 26 June 2018
Lincoln Financial Field will be one of the host venues for the 2019 edition of the biennial tournament, sources confirmed to the Inquirer and Daily News.

— jonathan tannenwald, Philly.com, "Philadelphia's Lincoln Financial Field to host 2019 Concacaf Gold Cup games," 14 May 2018
The state is soliciting proposals from pay and benefits consultants to help put together a new and apparently improved version of its biennial employee compensation study.

— ted sickinger, OregonLive.com, "Oregon launches new study of employee pay and benefits," 12 May 2018
Mittermeier, the chief conservation officer for Global Wildlife Conservation, is the seventh winner of the biennial prize, which the Indianapolis Zoological Society, Inc. announced today.

— sarah bowman, Indianapolis Star, "The 2018 Indianapolis Prize winner has discovered 18 species, meet Russ Mittermeier," 12 June 2018

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'biennial.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.

Did You Know?

Biennial conventions, celebrations, competitions, and sports events come every two years. Biennials are plants that live two years, bearing flowers and fruit only in the second year. (Carrots and sugar beets are two examples; since we're only interested in their roots, we don't wait another year to see their flower and fruit.) In contrast, semiannual means "twice a year". But no one can agree whether biweekly means "twice a week" or "every two weeks", and whether bimonthly means "twice a month" or "every two months". Maybe we should stop using both of them until we can decide.

First Known Use of biennial

1562

in the meaning defined at sense 1

See Words from the same year

NEW! Time Traveler

Other Number-Related Terms

jubilee, myriad, quarantine, score, twain

BIENNIAL Defined for English Language Learners

biennial

adjective

Definition of biennial for English Language Learners

: happening every two years
of a plant : living for only two years or seasons : having a life cycle that is two years or seasons long

BIENNIAL Defined for Kids

biennial

adjective bi·en·ni·al \ bī-ˈe-nē-əl \

Definition of biennial for Students

1 : occurring every two years

a biennial celebration

2 : growing stalks and leaves one year and flowers and fruit the next before dying

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biennially

\-ē-ə-lē\ adverb

Word Root of biennial

The Latin word annus, meaning “year,” gives us the root ann or enn. Words from the Latin annus have something to do with a year. Anything that is annual happens once a year and anything biennial happens once every two years. An anniversary is the return every year of the date on which something special happened. Something perennial continues all year long or comes back each year.