penultimate
adjective
Did you know?
Penultimate isn't the last word in words for things that are next to last. There is a pair of noun synonyms that are used commonly enough to have gained entry into abridged dictionaries: penult and penultima. Although all three can refer to something that's next to last, penult and penultima are usually a bit more specific; they are used most often to identify the next to last syllable of a word. All three derive from paenultima, the feminine of paenultimus, a Latin root from paene ("almost") and ultimus ("last"). You may occasionally hear the word penultimate used as an intensified version of ultimate, as in "a race they've called 'the penultimate challenge.'" This use isn't typically found in edited prose, however, or in dictionaries. One of our editors discusses it in this video.
Examples of penultimate in a Sentence
Edward P. Jones, The Known World, 2003
He threw harder in the last inning than he did in the first, whiffing pinch hitter Darryl Strawberry with a 97-mph heater for the penultimate out and blowing away the final hitter, Knoblauch, with a 96-mph fastball.
—Tom Verducci, Sports Illustrated, 27 Mar. 2000
… regulations have cleared the penultimate hurdle and appear ready to become law …
—John Aloysius Farrell, Sunday Denver (CO) Post, 2 Sept. 1984
Pompey … speaks of her mother's difficult death and of her own longings for death and rises to a rare moment of lyric power in the novel's penultimate paragraph.
—Joyce Carol Oates, New York Times Book Review, 3 Oct. 1982
the penultimate syllable of the word
Randall Colburn, EW.com, 25 Apr. 2025
Entertainment gossip and news from Newsweek's network of contributors
Paramount+ has released the plot details for the penultimate episode of Happy Face, titled My Jesperson Girls.
—Josh Hammer, MSNBC Newsweek, 22 Apr. 2025
As the show’s ever-ballooning case and central conspiracy come barreling toward their final reveals, the penultimate episode takes us there via fast, nimble strides along its own axis of pulp and realism in the broader crime genre.
—Andy Andersen, Vulture, 18 Apr. 2025
Except for Season 3, when the field trip was the penultimate episode, each of the ABC sitcom’s season finales has taken place off-campus, where the teachers and students run into problems and feelings that don’t normally come up in the classroom.
—Selome Hailu, Variety, 17 Apr. 2025
See All Example Sentences for penultimate
Cite this Entry
“Penultimate.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/penultimate. Accessed 4 May. 2025.
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