autonomous

American  

[aw-ton-uh-muhs] / ɔˈtɒn ə məs /

adjective

1. Government.

   1. self-governing; independent; subject to its own laws only.

   2. pertaining to an autonomy, or a self-governing community.

2. having autonomy; not subject to control from outside; independent.

   a subsidiary that functioned as an autonomous unit.

3. (of a machine, device, etc.) able to operate with little or no human control or intervention.

   an autonomous vehicle.

4. Biology.

   1. existing and functioning as an independent organism.

   2. growing naturally or spontaneously, without cultivation.

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autonomous British  

/ ɔːˈtɒnəməs /

adjective

1. (of a community, country, etc) possessing a large degree of self-government

2. of or relating to an autonomous community

3. independent of others

4. philosophy

   1. acting or able to act in accordance with rules and principles of one's own choosing

   2. (in the moral philosophy of Kant, of an individual's will) directed to duty rather than to some other end Compare heteronomous See also categorical imperative

5. biology existing as an organism independent of other organisms or parts

6. a variant spelling of autonomic

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Other Word Forms

• nonautonomousness
  noun
• nonautonomous
  adjective
• autonomously
  adverb

Etymology

Origin of autonomous

First recorded in 1790–1800; from Greek autónomos “with laws of one's own, independent,” equivalent to auto- auto- ¹ + nóm(os) “law, custom” + -os adjective suffix

Explanation

Autonomous describes things that function separately or independently. Once you move out of your parents' house and get your own job, you will be an autonomous member of the family. This adjective autonomous is often used of countries, regions, or groups that have the right to govern themselves: Vatican City, where the Catholic pope lives, is an autonomous territory located within the city limits of Rome. The corresponding noun is autonomy, referring to the state of existing or functioning independently. Autonomous comes from the Greek roots autos, "self," and nomos, "law."

Example Sentences

S&P Dow Jones Indices said of the Alphabet addition; “Alphabet’s diversified technology and digital services portfolio spans advertising, cloud infrastructure, artificial intelligence, hardware, autonomous mobility, healthcare technology, and media distribution.”

From Barron's • Jun. 23, 2026

FSD doesn’t make vehicles fully autonomous and is meant to be used only with a fully attentive driver, according to Tesla’s website.

From The Wall Street Journal • Jun. 23, 2026

Its Agentforce platform, which lets companies build autonomous agents using their internal data warehouses, grew 205% year over year to record $1.2 billion in annual recurring revenue, the company reported on last month’s earnings call.

From MarketWatch • Jun. 22, 2026

Heavy-duty autonomous vehicles, however, are required to begin testing with a human safety driver and must complete 500,000 miles of testing at each stage of certification.

From Los Angeles Times • Jun. 21, 2026

It is amazing that such an institution, exerting so much influence on academic science, has been able to remain so absolutely autonomous.

From "The Lives of a Cell" by Lewis Thomas

Related Words

• self-governing
• sovereign