mirror image

noun

1

a

: something that has its parts reversely arranged in comparison with another similar thing or that is reversed with reference to an intervening axis or plane

b

: the direct opposite

2

: image sense 4

Synonyms

• image
• twin
• replica
• picture
• clone
• portrait
• duplicate

Examples of mirror image in a Sentence

The left side of the building is a mirror image of the right.

looking at the idealistic intern, the elderly physician could not help but see the mirror image of himself 40 years earlier

Recent Examples on the Web

Why not try and invest in the mirror image of that for faculty? —Shivaram Rajgopal, Forbes.com, 6 Sep. 2025

Flay lives in the Morris Adjmic–designed Sterling Mason, a condominium composed of a 1905 red brick warehouse adjoined with a newer, metallic mirror image. —Keith Flanagan, Architectural Digest, 2 Sep. 2025

The mathematicians connected one knot with an unknotting number of three to its mirror image to form a larger knot. —Max Springer, Scientific American, 2 Sep. 2025

Changing these molecules would create an unnatural mirror image of a cell, as different as your right hand from your left. —N'dea Yancey-Bragg, USA Today, 1 Sep. 2025

Word History

First Known Use

1885, in the meaning defined at sense 1a

Rhymes for mirror image

• scrimmage

Kids Definition

mirror image

noun

: something that has its parts joined together in much the same way as those of something else except that each part of one thing is directly opposite to the corresponding part of the other thing and located on the opposite side of, the same distance away from, and facing in the same way toward or away from an axis or plane between the two things

the two sides of an animal with bilateral symmetry are mirror images of each other

Medical Definition

mirror image

noun

: something that has its parts reversely arranged in comparison with another similar thing or that is reversed with reference to an intervening axis or plane