acquisition

American  

[ak-wuh-zish-uhn] / ˌæk wəˈzɪʃ ən /

noun

1. the act of acquiring or gaining possession.

   the acquisition of real estate.

2. something acquired; addition.

   public excitement about the museum's recent acquisitions.

3. the purchase of one business enterprise by another.

   the acquisition of a rival corporation;

   mergers and acquisitions.

4. Linguistics. the act or process of achieving mastery of a language or a linguistic rule or element.

   child language acquisition; second language acquisition.

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acquisition British  

/ ˌækwɪˈzɪʃən /

noun

1. the act of acquiring or gaining possession

2. something acquired

3. a person or thing of special merit added to a group

4. astronautics the process of locating a spacecraft, satellite, etc, esp by radar, in order to gather tracking and telemetric information

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Usage

What does acquisition mean? Acquisition most commonly means the process of obtaining something or the thing that is obtained. It is a noun form of the verb acquire, which most commonly means to get, buy, or learn. Acquire and acquisition have a lot of meanings that vary with context. Most of them refer to the act of getting something permanently. Acquisition is commonly used to refer to a company that is acquired by another company. It’s especially used this way in the phrase mergers and acquisitions. It’s also used in a specific way in the context of linguistics: language acquisition is the process of becoming fluent in a language. Example: The company announced plans for the acquisition of its largest competitor, raising concerns about it becoming a monopoly.

Other Word Forms

• acquisitional
  adjective
• acquisitor
  noun
• preacquisition
  noun
• proacquisition
  adjective
• reacquisition
  noun
• superacquisition
  noun

Etymology

Origin of acquisition

First recorded in 1375–1425; Middle English adquisicioun, a(c)quisicion, from Latin acquīsītiōn-, stem of acquīsītiō, from acquīsīt(us) “acquired” (past participle of acquīrere; see acquire) + -iō -ion

Explanation

An acquisition is something you acquire — a book, a skill or if you are a mogul, a company. It describes things you have purchased, things you have learned, or things you have gotten. Acquisition has a formal sense to it. We don't talk about our new jeans as our latest acquisition, unless we are the kind of person who refers to their latest copy of Vogue as their Bible. It is very commonly used to refer to paintings purchased by museums — in fact, large museums have acquisition departments.

Example Sentences

During the previous acquisition boom, India was in the midst of a roaring bull market.

From BBC • May 24, 2026

DeepMind — established in 2010 by Hassabis and fellow technologists Shane Legg and Mustafa Suleyman — became the first modern artificial-general-intelligence lab, and its 2014 acquisition by Google famously galvanized the creation of OpenAI.

From MarketWatch • May 23, 2026

The cosmetics company ended its acquisition talks with Spain’s Puig Brands.

From Barron's • May 22, 2026

The German media company is expanding in the U.S. with the acquisition of Bisnow, forming the new Brew Media Group.

From The Wall Street Journal • May 21, 2026

He makes the acquisition of knowledge feel like a secret, beautiful thing, and an ancient thing.

From "Allegiant" by Veronica Roth

Related Words

• addition
• gain
• procurement
• purchase
• recovery