categorize
Americanverb (used with object)
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categorizes,
present (3rd person singular)
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categorized,
past participle, past
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categorizing
present participle
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to arrange in categories or classes; classify.
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to describe by labeling or giving a name to; characterize.
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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categoristnoun
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categorizationnoun
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decategorizationnoun
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subcategorizationnoun
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decategorizeverb (used with object)
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miscategorizeverb (used with object)
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recategorizeverb (used with object)
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miscategorizedadjective
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uncategorizedadjective
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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categorizesimple
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categorizessimple
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have categorizedperfect
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has categorizedperfect
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am categorizingprogressive
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are categorizingprogressive
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is categorizingprogressive
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have been categorizingperfect progressive
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has been categorizingperfect progressive
Past
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categorizedsimple
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had categorizedperfect
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was categorizingprogressive
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were categorizingprogressive
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had been categorizingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of categorize
First recorded in 1695–1705; categor(y) + -ize
Explanation
If you decided to categorize your wardrobe, you could sort it by type (pants or shirts), or by color. To categorize is to put something into a category. When you think of categorizing things, imagine taking a pile of marbles and putting them into little boxes by color. You are sorting things by how they are alike. Scientists categorize animals and plants by their properties. Doctors categorize illnesses by whether they are caused by viruses or bacteria. In movies, high school students are often categorized as jocks, popular kids, troublemakers, and geeks.
Vocabulary lists containing categorize
Vocabulary of the Common Core
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Content Summary G.2: Regionalization
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Content Summary 5.1: Causes of the Atlantic Revolutions
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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:
Large language models such as GPT and Gemini are changing that equation by allowing researchers to process and categorize vast amounts of text more consistently and quickly.
From Science Daily ● Sep. 13, 2026
He talked about spending time in Mexico and realizing how much depth and labor went into dishes that diners elsewhere might casually categorize as “Mexican food.”
From Salon ● Sep. 1, 2026
Ms. Dixon even tries to categorize the different types of artistic offense.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 21, 2026
That includes the way scientists categorize species within Homo as well as Australopithecus and Paranthropus, all of which lived during the past 5 million years.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 20, 2026
Then I categorize every item as many different ways as I can think of.
From "Things Not Seen" by Andrew Clements
The study, published in Nature's Communications Earth & Environment, categorizes warming periods that occur ahead of and following MHWs.
From Science Daily ● Sep. 30, 2026
Just 16% of respondents expressed a state of confidence about their money, a separate bucket that the survey categorizes as financially “fulfilled.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 2, 2026
Wall Street categorizes metals as precious, base/industrial, and maybe “other” for the weird ones.
From Barron's ● Dec. 26, 2025
Yeh categorizes sweet salads with affection and a wink: cookie salads, Jell-O salads, candy bar salads, fluffs.
From Salon ● Apr. 27, 2025
Sister Miriam Joseph* categorizes the relation of the trivial arts as follows: logic is concerned with the thing-as-it-is-known; grammar is concerned with the thing-as-it-is-symbolized; rhetoric is concerned with the thing-as-it-is-communicated.
From "Words Like Loaded Pistols" by Sam Leith
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Climate Prediction Center said last week that there was virtually a 100% chance that the El Niño this season will be categorized as “very strong.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 12, 2026
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Climate Prediction Center said Thursday that there is virtually a 100% chance that the El Niño this season will be categorized as “very strong.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 10, 2026
While Bonta categorized those threats as bluster and blackmail, people close to Ellison said they were genuine.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 7, 2026
The A&E network categorized “Desert Law,” the TV series about the Pima County Sheriff’s Department, as a modest success, a spokesman said.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 2, 2026
All cancers originate from a single cell gone wrong and are categorized based on the type of cell they start from.
From "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks" by Rebecca Skloot
The software also sends reminder emails and phone alerts to prompt people to keep up with categorizing transactions that are automatically pulled in or inputting new ones manually.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 11, 2026
Agencies must submit “contingency plans” categorizing which employees are essential on a standardized worksheet.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 15, 2025
That's the lower limit of categorizing objects on the Torino Scale.
From Salon ● Mar. 3, 2025
During early assessments of impact risk, Apophis reached a rating of Torino Scale 4, which is a scale for categorizing potential Earth impact events.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 19, 2025
Stopping before the narrow garage, he sniffed the fumes from Paradise with great sensory pleasure, the protruding hairs in his nostrils analyzing, cataloguing, categorizing, and classifying the distinct odors of hot dog, mustard, and lubricant.
From "A Confederacy of Dunces" by John Kennedy Toole
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Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
