offspring
Americannoun
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offspring,
plural
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offsprings
plural
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children or young of a particular parent or progenitor.
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a child or animal in relation to the parent or parents.
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a descendant.
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descendants collectively.
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the product, result, or effect of something.
the offspring of an inventive mind.
noun
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the immediate descendant or descendants of a person, animal, etc; progeny
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a product, outcome, or result
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of offspring
First recorded before 950; Middle English; Old English ofspring; see off, of 1, spring (in the sense “to descend from”)
Explanation
Puppies are the offspring, or children, of a mamma dog. You're the offspring of your biological parents. This is basically another word for children. Baby horses, gorillas, lizards, and humans are all offspring. A woman who gives birth to quadruplets suddenly has a lot of offspring. But this word isn't limited to biological creations — you could say that a project you've been laboring over is your offspring. Albert Einstein's offspring included many groundbreaking theories, and the scientists who followed up on Einstein's ideas are considered his intellectual offspring.
Vocabulary lists containing offspring
It's All in the Family
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Christmas Carol Vocab: A Lyrical Lexicon
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"The Origin of Species by Natural Selection" by Charles Darwin: Essential Words
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Mississippi elected two Black U.S. senators and a lieutenant governor, and former slaves and their offspring enjoyed freedom of speech, movement and opportunity.
From Salon ● Nov. 3, 2026
He and several other of the Huerta offspring devoted their lives to the UFW and related causes, basking in a sense that their family played a part in history.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 28, 2026
The zoo previously hosted a pair, Lun Lun and Yang Yang, who had seven offspring.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 25, 2026
The offspring of one of the world's rarest trees has been given a new home in south-west Scotland as conservationists step up efforts to save the species from extinction.
From BBC ● Sep. 17, 2026
“What we have here, my good comrades in arms,” said Jess grandly, “is stage one of our anti-battering-ram scheme, thanks to my small offspring here who found the hornets’ nest.”
From "Redwall" by Brian Jacques
It sticks out like a sore thumb among the Camden Yards offsprings that followed.
From Washington Times ● Feb. 16, 2023
Internal fertilization leads to more genetic variations and increases the survival rates of offsprings.
From Textbooks ● Jun. 9, 2022
In effect, Aristotle was supposing that the younger offsprings were from a litter which was the result of the second pregnancy.
From Scientific American ● Apr. 27, 2011
Toys R Us' "Fabulous 15" top picks includes Monster High dolls, offsprings to famous monster characters, and Hasbro's Cuponk, a game that challenges players to master ball-and-cup tricks using a wall.
From Reuters ● Sep. 21, 2010
Her face was really wonderful and beautiful, and in it I saw far more hope for the happiness of Emmeline's offsprings than in that of the "widow."
From Mothering on Perilous by Lucy S. Furman
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Get a wordDefinitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
