designate
Americanverb (used with object)
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to mark or point out; indicate; show; specify.
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to denote; indicate; signify.
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to name; entitle; style.
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to nominate or select for a duty, office, purpose, etc.; appoint; assign.
adjective
verb
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to indicate or specify
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to give a name to; style; entitle
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to select or name for an office or duty; appoint
adjective
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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designatornoun
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dedesignateverb (used with object)
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redesignateverb (used with object)
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designativeadjective
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designatoryadjective
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nondesignateadjective
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nondesignativeadjective
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undesignatedadjective
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undesignativeadjective
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well-designatedadjective
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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designatesimple
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designatessimple
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have designatedperfect
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has designatedperfect
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am designatingprogressive
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are designatingprogressive
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is designatingprogressive
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have been designatingperfect progressive
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has been designatingperfect progressive
Past
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designatedsimple
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had designatedperfect
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was designatingprogressive
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were designatingprogressive
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had been designatingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of designate
1640–50; < Latin dēsignātus, past participle of dēsignāre. See design, -ate 1
Explanation
To designate is to give something a specific status. If you designate your house an opera-free zone, it means that you've officially declared that no opera is allowed to be played there. To give a person or thing an official status is to designate it as something, like when you designate a meeting place if members of your group get lost at the amusement park. Sometimes, it can carry responsibility or an assignment, like when your teammates designate you as the captain. It can also show a category, like when you designate certain books to the humor section of the bookstore where you work.
Vocabulary lists containing designate
Baseball: A Lexicon
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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:
For clients who like to pick stocks, advisers may designate a “play money” bucket.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 13, 2026
The Defense Department has faced legal challenges for the process it uses to designate Chinese companies as military entities.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 8, 2026
“After thoughtful discussions, the City of West Hollywood, the WeHo Pride production team, and Kathy Hilton have determined that the 2026 WeHo Pride Parade will not designate a Grand Marshal Icon honoree,” read the statement.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 4, 2026
The family’s attempt to designate 36 grandchildren as beneficiaries was rejected due to issues with a spousal waiver.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 15, 2026
The fair prompted President Harrison to designate October 12 a national holiday, Columbus Day, which today serves to anchor a few thousand parades and a three-day weekend.
From "The Devil in the White City" by Erik Larson
The case stems from a broader legal dispute over the renaming of the cultural institution, which US law designates as a memorial to President John F Kennedy.
From BBC ● Jun. 13, 2026
The Five-Year Plan designates quantum as one of seven frontier technologies, with coordinated commercialization efforts focused on a smaller set of institutions.
From Barron's ● Apr. 14, 2026
An uncritical viewing designates this as another “all’s well that ends well” gag.
From Salon ● Mar. 6, 2026
The law also outlaws discrimination based on ethnicity and designates an important Kurdish holiday, Nowruz, as a national holiday.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 18, 2026
Goss used the pronoun that designates a male animal, not the pronoun for a human being in the masculine role of kemmer.
From "The Left Hand of Darkness" by Ursula K. Le Guin
For these parents, access to others who’ve gone through the same tragedy is a lifeline and a rare occurrence outside designated support spaces.
From Slate ● Jul. 19, 2026
Otero Alcantara, designated a prisoner of conscience by Amnesty International, was sentenced to five years in prison in 2022 for insulting national symbols, contempt and disturbing the public order.
From Barron's ● Jul. 18, 2026
If it’s a small estate, a designated successor acting under state laws would receive the details.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 15, 2026
Iran has asserted that it has total control over traffic in the Gulf and is willing to barrage ships that don’t travel along its designated corridor.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 14, 2026
And that we absolutely will not leave the designated trails, the boardwalks.
From "The Sea in Winter" by Christine Day
On his first day back in office, US President Donald Trump announced he would increase pressure on Mexico and the cartels, including designating the criminal enterprises terrorist groups.
From BBC ● Jul. 20, 2026
You can do this by designating a child as an authorized user, which is a person added to a credit-card account by the primary cardholder, although some issuers have age minimums as low as 13.
From MarketWatch ● Jun. 9, 2026
But as Exxon replies, a “substantial portion of the S&P 500 including the majority of Delaware incorporated issuers, maintain exclusive-forum provisions designating a single court for internal affairs litigation.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 18, 2026
That led to the Department of Defense designating Anthropic as a supply chain risk and barring the use of its tools at the Pentagon, following a six-month phase-out.
From Salon ● Mar. 23, 2026
“What were your instructions,” Eldon Rosen asked, “if you wound up designating a human as android?”
From "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" by Philip K. Dick
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.
