acquisition

American  

[ak-wuh-zish-uhn] / ˌæk wəˈzɪʃ ən /

noun

acquisitions plural

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

Derived Forms

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

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• acquisitions
  plural

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

See Examples For:

acquisition acquisitions

“We are accelerating across our key metrics, achieving a step-change in churn reduction while lowering our customer acquisition and retention costs,” Schulman said.

From MarketWatch ● Jul. 24, 2026

“The live question in 2026 is acquisition: where the books came from, who paid for them, and what the company knew about their provenance when it hit download,” he said.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 23, 2026

SAP said the slowdown in operating profit growth was caused by accelerated research and development investments and the acquisition of Reltio.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 23, 2026

As FTC chair under former President Joe Biden, she unsuccessfully challenged Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard, but succeeded in blocking the merger of grocery-store rivals Kroger’s and Albertsons.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 22, 2026

A tingle rushes up my arm at the acquisition.

From "Warcross" by Marie Lu

Investors seem to be worried about the scope of the company’s spending on infrastructure and acquisitions to support the development of generative artificial intelligence technology.

From MarketWatch ● Jul. 24, 2026

Often known as zombie funds, these funds are no longer raising money or making new acquisitions, in part because fund managers haven’t been able to sell their remaining assets.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 22, 2026

Smith said he is looking for more potential acquisitions that could add to Altana’s trade enforcement, facilitation and compliance offerings.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 21, 2026

Anderson said his firm expects to see more mergers and acquisitions in this quarter as space companies expand their offerings in search of profits.

From MarketWatch ● Jul. 15, 2026

I was interviewing for a paralegal position in the mergers and acquisitions department of a prestigious multi-national corporate law firm.

From "Proud" by Ibtihaj Muhammad

Related Words

• addition
• gain
• procurement
• purchase
• recovery