chimpanzee

American  

[chim-pan-zee, chim-pan-zee] / ˌtʃɪm pænˈzi, tʃɪmˈpæn zi /

noun

• chimpanzees
  plural

1. a very social great ape of sub-Saharan Africa, belonging to the genus Pan and having a brown-to-black coat, a relatively hairless face with a rounded muzzle, prominent ears, and hands adapted for knuckle-walking, and noted for its intelligence and humanlike behavior: both species, the common chimpanzee (P. troglodytes ) and the bonobo (P. paniscus ), are greatly reduced in number and considered endangered.

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chimpanzee British  

/ ˌtʃɪmpænˈziː /

noun

1. a gregarious and intelligent anthropoid ape, Pan troglodytes, inhabiting forests in central W Africa

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• chimpanzees
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of chimpanzee

First recorded in 1730–40; origin uncertain; possibly from Vili , a Bantu language spoken on the Atlantic coast between southern Gabon and northern Angola

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Compare meaning

How does chimpanzee compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:

• orangutan vs. chimpanzee

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Explanation

Chimpanzees are one of our closest ape relatives, along with bonobos. In the wild, chimpanzees live in social family groups and swing from tree to tree using their long arms. As a human, you share 98.7 percent of your genes with chimpanzees, as well as a common ancestor. Known as chimps for short, these endangered primates have furry bodies and smooth, expressive faces. They're one of the few non-human animals that use tools, and in captivity have been taught basic sign language. Chimpanzee is from the Bantu word chimpenze, "ape."

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

chimpanzee chimpanzees

During a tree climb, a chimpanzee ankle can flex upward by about 45 degrees.

From Science Daily ● Aug. 31, 2026

The vision was conceived by Jane Goodall, the late, famed chimpanzee expert, and Margarita Pagliai, who founded Seven Arrows and Little Dolphins Preschool in the Palisades.

From Los Angeles Times ● May 23, 2026

If you compare the smartest nonhuman animal, the chimpanzee, to what Mr. Lefebvre regards as the smartest bird, the New Caledonian crow, chimps emerge on top.

From The Wall Street Journal ● May 22, 2026

Ai, a female chimpanzee famous for her cognitive skills has died at 49, according to the Japanese institute where she lived.

From BBC ● Jan. 12, 2026

That was the first wild chimpanzee infant that I ever saw close up, nearly four years after I had begun my research.

From "My Life with the Chimpanzees" by Jane Goodall

"We are less intelligent than superintelligent AI. If you ask chimpanzees how humans could wipe them out, they probably wouldn't be able to give you all the right answers."

From Barron's ● Sep. 11, 2026

However, we still don’t know what accumulative stone throwing sites might mean to the chimpanzees themselves nor why they do it.

From Science Daily ● Aug. 28, 2026

Given our evolutionary relatedness to chimpanzees, we hope accumulative stone throwing can help us understand the emergence of complex communication and stone tool use over the course of human evolution.

From Science Daily ● Aug. 28, 2026

Human beings are chimpanzees, and are therefore pack animals, and the average IQ is 100, meaning half of all people have an IQ lower than 100.

From MarketWatch ● Jul. 22, 2026

For example, common chimpanzees have a genetic tendency to live in hierarchical groups headed by an alpha male.

From "Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind" by Yuval Noah Harari

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