inanimate
adjective
Did you know?
The couch you sit on while you watch TV is an inanimate object, as is your footrest, your bag of snacks, and your remote control. Spend too much time on that couch and you risk becoming a couch potato. (A potato is an inanimate object.)
Synonyms
Examples of inanimate in a Sentence
Laura Newberry, Los Angeles Times, 5 Sep. 2023
Maybe you aren’t taken any further than the boxy TV in your living room — the one that was normally off-limits during daytime hours, but which became an inanimate physician and endlessly enabling babysitter whenever your body’s temperature hit 100.
—Daniel Fienberg, The Hollywood Reporter, 26 Aug. 2023
Early on in the raunchy talking-animals comedy Strays, a montage plays of four dogs humping inanimate lawn ornaments, guzzling beer leaking from trash bags, and bonding over a plan to bite off a man’s genitals.
—Shirley Li, The Atlantic, 19 Aug. 2023
After its lunar flyby, the spacecraft — which is designed to fly astronauts but is carrying only inanimate, scientific payloads for its first mission — is expected to travel more than 40,000 miles beyond the far side of the moon, the furthest a spacecraft intended to carry humans has ever traveled.
—Jackie Wattles, CNN, 21 Nov. 2022
Though it's designed to carry humans, Orion's passengers for this test mission will be of the inanimate variety, including some mannequins collecting vital data to help future crews.
—Jackie Wattles, CNN, 15 Nov. 2022
Even inanimate bodies engage in unfiltered embrace, as with two mannequins, plastic legs intertwined and plastic faces nearly touching, on display in a storefront window.
—Nicole Acheampong, The Atlantic, 15 Mar. 2023
To save the kid from his vices, popular cartoon characters come nightmarishly crawling out of pictures and possessing the inanimate bodies of licensed plush toys.
—Vulture, 13 June 2023
Usually, small asteroids are said to be the size of buses, skyscrapers, football fields, tennis courts, cars—mundane, inanimate things.
—Marina Koren, The Atlantic, 26 Jan. 2023
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These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'inanimate.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
Word History
Middle English, from Late Latin inanimatus, from Latin in- + animatus, past participle of animare to animate
15th century, in the meaning defined at sense 1
Phrases Containing inanimate
Dictionary Entries Near inanimate
Cite this Entry
“Inanimate.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/inanimate. Accessed 2 Dec. 2023.
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Kids Definition
inanimate
adjective
Medical Definition
inanimate
adjective
More from Merriam-Webster on inanimate
Nglish: Translation of inanimate for Spanish Speakers
Britannica English: Translation of inanimate for Arabic Speakers
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