adjective
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not fully grown or developed
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deficient in maturity; lacking wisdom, insight, emotional stability, etc
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geography a less common term for youthful
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of immature
First recorded in 1540–50, immature is from the Latin word immātūrus unripe, hence, untimely. See im- 2, mature
Explanation
Use the adjective immature to describe something that is not fully grown: “Elizabeth rescued an immature sparrow that had fallen from its nest during the storm.” When used in a general sense, immature describes something in an early stage of development, such as an immature fruit tree or an immature political system. When applied to people, however, immature is often used to describe someone who behaves in a childish way. So if your 42-year-old brother spends the entire holiday weekend playing video games and then throws a temper tantrum when you ask him to help with the dishes, the word you’re looking for to describe him is probably immature.
Vocabulary lists containing immature
List 5
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Brown Girl Dreaming
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Made You Look: Synonyms for "Immature"
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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.
Luiz Felipe Scolari saw an extraordinary player who was immature and obsessed with showing off.
From BBC ● Nov. 5, 2026
When the team examined the activity of immature neurons more closely, they identified striking differences between the groups.
From Science Daily ● Oct. 27, 2026
To explore this further, the researchers plan to investigate how immature neurons communicate and interact with neighboring brain cells.
From Science Daily ● Oct. 27, 2026
I remember mentioning it to the writers that it felt immature for him to do that, it felt a little bit out of character —
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 23, 2026
I want to laugh, but I decide not to be, as Jasmine would say, immature.
From "King and the Dragonflies" by Kacen Callender
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Get a wordDefinitions 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.
