Synonyms

vibrate

American

[vahy-breyt] / ˈvaɪ breɪt /

verb (used without object)

to move rhythmically and steadily to and fro, as a pendulum; oscillate.
to move to and fro or up and down quickly and repeatedly; quiver; tremble.
(of sounds) to produce or have a quivering or vibratory effect; resound.

Synonyms:

echo
to thrill, as in emotional response.
to move between alternatives or extremes; fluctuate; vacillate.

verb (used with object)

to cause to move rhythmically and steadily to and fro, swing, or oscillate.
to cause to move to and fro or up and down quickly and repeatedly; cause to quiver or tremble.
to give forth or emit by, or as by, vibration.
to measure or indicate by vibration or oscillation.

a pendulum vibrating seconds.

vibrate British

/ vaɪˈbreɪt, ˈvaɪbrəˌtaɪl /

verb

to move or cause to move back and forth rapidly; shake, quiver, or throb
(intr) to oscillate
to send out (a sound) by vibration; resonate or cause to resonate
(intr) to waver
physics to undergo or cause to undergo an oscillatory or periodic process, as of an alternating current; oscillate
rare (intr) to respond emotionally; thrill

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Synonym Usage

See shake.

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

Inflected Forms

Participles

Conjugated Forms

Present

Past

Future

Etymology

Origin of vibrate

First recorded in 1610–20; from Latin vibrātus (past participle of vibrāre “to move to and fro”); see -ate ¹

Explanation

When you feel something vibrate, it trembles and shakes. A mild earthquake, for example, might make your chandelier vibrate. A hummingbird's wings vibrate, and so does an electric toothbrush. That extremely rapid back-and-forth movement is what happens when something vibrates. Something can also vibrate in a more musical, resonant way — the sound of an organ might vibrate through a church, for example. The root is the Latin word vibratus, which means "move quickly to and fro or shake."

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Vocabulary lists containing vibrate

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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:

vibrate vibrates vibrated vibrating

At ordinary temperatures, heat causes atoms to vibrate constantly.

From Science Daily ● Aug. 8, 2026

Lisa-Kaindé: It’s about living in a way that is aligned with what makes you vibrate, what makes you feel alive.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 28, 2026

“Nothing beats feeling the ground vibrate, seeing the charting of the wheels and hearing the whistle,” he said.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 21, 2026

Rare earths are likewise found in every smartphone, enhancing screen performance and enabling the phone to vibrate.

From Barron's ● Feb. 4, 2026

Obinze was hoping his phone would vibrate, and chafing under his hope.

From "Americanah" by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Some fans do just that, but the packed stadium vibrates harder with cheers as thousands of phones stay in the air.

From BBC ● Aug. 6, 2026

"What happens in any part of this ocean vibrates through all of us," she told AFP.

From Barron's ● Jul. 10, 2026

Even if you never bore witness to that outrageous performance, its elemental alchemy vibrates in the band’s most popular songs, each of them calling to us with purpose.

From Salon ● Jun. 7, 2026

When two black holes merge, the newly formed object vibrates, much like a struck bell.

From Science Daily ● Feb. 1, 2026

My phone vibrates with a new text from Serenity.

From "I Can Make This Promise" by Christine Day

They also approached the spiders with a tuning fork that vibrated at the same frequency as the insects’ beating wings.

From Science Magazine ● Dec. 4, 2024

About an hour after the first message, phones again vibrated with a new alert from the Home Front Command, telling people they could leave shelters and protected areas.

From BBC ● Oct. 1, 2024

“It just hit me here in my visceral and vibrated through me and that was it,” recalls Creed Bratton of that fateful day nearly 70 years ago.

From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 26, 2024

People in the stands practically vibrated with it.

From Salon ● Aug. 7, 2024

First, there had been the ones who tracked mud across his floors and slammed his doors, so that the whole of him vibrated uncomfortably.

From "Ophie's Ghosts" by Justina Ireland

"It then carried on going for a couple of minutes but there was a horrible vibrating sound."

From BBC ● Aug. 14, 2026

Conversations stretch for hours without the interruption of a vibrating phone.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 16, 2026

Researchers later realized this pattern resembles the harmonics of a vibrating string.

From Science Daily ● May 19, 2026

A vibrating violin behind a fiery curtain and a song about star-crossed planets are among the favourites to win this year's Eurovision Song Contest.

From Barron's ● May 15, 2026

My eyes shoot open the next morning and I look for what woke me, seeing my phone vibrating noisily on the floor, having free-fallen off the table.

From "Five Feet Apart" by Rachael Lippincott

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023