ape
Americannoun
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apes
plural
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Anthropology, Zoology. any member of the superfamily Hominoidea, the two extant branches of which are the lesser apes (gibbons) and the great apes (humans, chimpanzees, gorillas, and orangutans).
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(loosely) any primate except humans.
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an imitator; mimic.
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Informal. a big, ugly, clumsy person.
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Disparaging and Offensive. (used as a slur against a member of a racial or ethnic minority group, especially a Black person.)
verb (used with object)
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apes,
present (3rd person singular)
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aped,
past participle, past
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aping
present participle
adjective
noun
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any of various primates, esp those of the family Pongidae , in which the tail is very short or absent See anthropoid ape See also great ape
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(not in technical use) any monkey
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an imitator; mimic
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informal a coarse, clumsy, or rude person
verb
Sensitive Note
See simianization.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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apesimple
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apessimple
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have apedperfect
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has apedperfect
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am apingprogressive
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are apingprogressive
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is apingprogressive
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have been apingperfect progressive
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has been apingperfect progressive
Past
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apedsimple
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had apedperfect
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was apingprogressive
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were apingprogressive
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had been apingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of ape
First recorded before 900; Middle English; Old English apa; cognate with Old Saxon apo, Old Norse api, Old High German affo ( German Affe ); further origin uncertain
Explanation
To ape someone is to imitate them, often in a mocking way. Most people don't like being aped. To ape is to imitate, but it can mean a few different things. One type of aping is to blatantly imitate something or someone in every way. That's considered a bad thing because it's so unoriginal — it's a rip-off. Another kind of aping is like a caricature — to ape in this way is a way of making fun or spoofing someone. Either way, you probably don't want to be accused of aping.
Vocabulary lists containing ape
A Vocabulary Bestiary: Animals That Behave as Verbs
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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:
The great ape, which was discovered by a farmer, was rescued and given emergency treatment for hypoxia, but later died.
From BBC ● Sep. 23, 2026
One naming gambit, though, might be close to a sure thing—when companies brazenly ape the theme du jour.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 11, 2026
Of course, AI can ape us, and create things based on our patterns.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 13, 2026
Younger ape fossils have been found across Africa, Asia, and Europe, but scientists continue to debate how these species were related and where their ancestors originated.
From Science Daily ● Jul. 24, 2026
Power lay in the brown swell of his forearms: authority sat on his shoulder and chattered in his ear like an ape.
From "Lord of the Flies" by William Golding
The Indonesian government has requested India hand over the apes, forestry ministry spokesman Ristianto Pribadi told AFP on Friday.
From Barron's ● Sep. 11, 2026
Photographs and videos widely shared online show the young apes sitting together on the forest floor and eating bananas, thousands of kilometres from the tropical rainforests where they belong.
From BBC ● Sep. 9, 2026
The critically endangered apes are found in the wild only in Indonesia and Malaysia.
From BBC ● Sep. 9, 2026
Their health is being closely monitored by veterinarians, but a preliminary check found no burn injuries on the two great apes.
From Barron's ● Sep. 5, 2026
All the outside portion of the monkey house was closed, so we went inside, and it was obvious that even in the winter those apes desperately need deodorant pads.
From "The Pigman" by Paul Zindel
In the 1960s, a primitive chatbot that mindlessly aped a therapist had people pouring their hearts out to it.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 29, 2025
His misguided approach - often aped on the Accidentally Partridge social media account, which shares cringeworthy clips of public figures - is "provocative" but, Coogan hopes, "never mean-spirited."
From BBC ● Sep. 30, 2025
Eggers’ “Nosferatu” succeeds because the director’s alterations to Henrik Galeen’s original 1922 screenplay, aped from Stoker’s novel with a few tweaks, are minimal.
From Salon ● Dec. 24, 2024
Global stocks in Asia and Europe aped at least some of that bounce overnight, but Wall St futures ticked back a touch ahead of Tuesday's opening bell.
From Reuters ● Oct. 17, 2023
She pushed her doll closer, so that Mrs. Fanning aped a surprised, cross-eyed look.
From "How the García Girls Lost Their Accents" by Julia Alvarez
So at the same time as worrying about their male classmates "bottling things up", girls are also feeling scared about how some boys and men - aping Manosphere behaviours - might act.
From BBC ● Apr. 12, 2026
Though Hale’s crude aping of Harold Lloyd is disappointing, the rest of the cast acquit themselves admirably—no one more so than La Plante as the sympathetic heroine.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 28, 2025
The group had started out as one of countless young English acts aping American R&B in the mid-’60s.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 10, 2025
The plan is to craft something “safe and fun” that will “bring joy” to its users, especially “women and gay people,” at a time when other social media executives are aping norms of reactionary ultramasculinity.
From Slate ● Feb. 11, 2025
It is only as I do it that I realize who I am aping, whose face frightened me into wanting it for my own.
From "The Cruel Prince" by Holly Black
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.
