acquire
Americanverb (used with object)
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to come into possession or ownership of; get as one's own.
to acquire property.
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to gain for oneself through one's actions or efforts.
to acquire learning.
- Synonyms:
- appropriate, attain, earn, win
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Linguistics. to achieve native or nativelike command of (a language or a linguistic rule or element).
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Military. to locate and track (a moving target) with a detector, as radar.
verb
Usage
What does acquire mean? Acquire most commonly means to get, buy, or learn.Acquire has a lot of meanings that vary with context. Most of them refer to the act of getting something permanently. It has more specific meanings in linguistics and in the context of the military. It’s easy to misspell acquire as aquire, so don’t forget the c.Example: When the merger is complete, our company will have acquired its largest competitor.
Related Words
See get.
Other Word Forms
- acquirability noun
- acquirable adjective
- acquirement noun
- acquirer noun
- preacquire verb
- reacquire verb (used with object)
- self-acquired adjective
- unacquirable adjective
- unacquired adjective
- well-acquired adjective
Etymology
Origin of acquire
First recorded in 1400–50; from Latin acquīrere “to add to one's possessions, acquire” ( ac- ac- + -quīrere, combining form of quaerere “to search for, obtain”); replacing late Middle English aquere, from Middle French aquerre, from Latin, as above
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.
In a league where young passers are the most prized commodities, the price to acquire him was as low as it gets: a pick in the last round of the draft.
In Finland, her reputation steadily grew, as she exhibited regularly and had work acquired by prestigious institutions.
Last year, Meta Platforms attempted to acquire it, though the startup declined the offer.
On a later visit, in 2009, Gastfriend struck up friendly conversations with Poles on the street, including an elderly man who acquired what had been a Jewish bakery before the war.
EquityZen, which operates a platform that lets people trade shares of private companies and is in the process of being acquired by Morgan Stanley, is also expecting 2026 to be a big year for IPOs.
From Barron's
Definitions 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.
