adopted
Britishadjective
Explanation
Something that's adopted has been deliberately chosen. Your adopted country is the place where you choose to live, not necessarily the one in which you're born. If you describe yourself as adopted, it means that you were taken in and raised by parents who didn't give birth to you. Just as your adoptive parents chose you to be their child, other adopted things are also chosen: an adopted language is one you learn and then choose to speak, and an adopted state is the place you freely decide to live in. The Latin root is adoptare, "choose for oneself."
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.
Nonprofit developers have adopted a strategy of rehabilitating entire blocks at once, and violent crime has plummeted.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 17, 2026
A similar mentality seems to have been adopted by some Southampton fans, who were chanting "we'll spy when we want" in their Carabao Cup opener against Colchester on Saturday.
From BBC ● Aug. 14, 2026
Over the years, other design houses have adopted hardware as part of their codes too.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 12, 2026
A similar strategy has been adopted in neighboring Mississippi.
From Barron's ● Aug. 11, 2026
He was an immigrant—he’d adopted France and loved it unabashedly, but he was now cast as a foreigner.
From "The Mona Lisa Vanishes" by Nicholas Day
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.
