incinerate
Americanverb (used with object)
-
incinerates,
present (3rd person singular)
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incinerated,
past participle, past
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incinerating
present participle
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
incineratesimple
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incineratessimple
-
have incineratedperfect
-
has incineratedperfect
-
am incineratingprogressive
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are incineratingprogressive
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is incineratingprogressive
-
have been incineratingperfect progressive
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has been incineratingperfect progressive
Past
-
incineratedsimple
-
had incineratedperfect
-
was incineratingprogressive
-
were incineratingprogressive
-
had been incineratingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of incinerate
1545–55; < Medieval Latin incinerātus (past participle of incinerāre ) < Latin in- in- 2 + ciner- (stem of cinis ) ashes + -ātus -ate 1
Explanation
See incinerate and think: "burn, baby, burn!" Whether it’s an old love letter that makes you sad or a terrible picture of yourself, it might be better just to incinerate it, meaning, you burn it. When you burn something beyond recognition, you incinerate it, as its Latin origins in incinerare, or "into ashes" shows. Once you incinerate something, that’s pretty much all that’s left: ashes. The word has a formal feel and is often used to refer to the removal of waste material — your city might incinerate garbage, for example — but you can use it any time you need to reduce something to ashes.
Vocabulary lists containing incinerate
The Book Thief
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Slaughterhouse-Five
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The Wednesday Wars
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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:
You probably aren’t rich or well-connected enough to have a 24 year-old incinerate your savings.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 4, 2026
The government will invest $3.5 billion in a project to build 34 waste-to-energy sites within two years that would incinerate garbage to produce electricity, he said.
From Barron's ● Mar. 10, 2026
One man was caught using a blowtorch to incinerate debris in West Hills as the Kenneth fire raged above him, police said.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 6, 2025
Some incinerate the remains with medical waste like tumors or kidney stones, while others opt for unmarked mass burials at cemeteries, and sometimes parents can find out a general area if they wish to visit.
From Slate ● Oct. 3, 2024
Would he suck out my soul and incinerate me?
From "Ready Player One: A Novel" by Ernest Cline
The machine incinerates the feathers at extremely high temperatures, measuring the emitted mercury.
From Reuters ● Aug. 5, 2023
Then a specialist smelting firm retrieves around 90% of the metals in the phone - a process which incinerates the plastic parts.
From BBC ● Nov. 29, 2021
Daenerys incinerates the rooms where, years ago, Ned argued with Robert and the Small Council not to assassinate her.
From Slate ● May 17, 2019
This is the game you burn, even though it may also be the game that incinerates the team’s playoff chances.
From Washington Post ● Dec. 20, 2016
Springs of ancient wrath spray and fling its repressed fury , heeding not whom or what it incinerates when gravity reclaims lava?s spurts .
From NATURAE by Dom
Elsewhere in France, a fire in the Fontainebleau forest near Paris incinerated a tenth of the UNESCO-listed site in mid-July, after several other wildfires in the country.
From Barron's ● Aug. 1, 2026
In a Sierra Nevada canyon all but incinerated in the 2021 KNP Complex fire, a new forest of California’s beloved giant sequoias is now growing.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 13, 2026
Globally, it's estimated that 300,000 disposable nappies are sent to landfill or incinerated every minute, leading to environmental issues as many contain plastics and synthetic materials and can take hundreds of years to decompose.
From BBC ● Mar. 12, 2026
For example, leveraged funds attract savers with quick short-term gains but have incinerated billions of dollars through gradual value decay tied to volatility.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 15, 2026
The whole world stood by breathlessly, wondering if he would be incinerated when he reentered Earth’s atmosphere and the capsule emitted flames.
From "Reaching for the Moon" by Katherine Johnson
"By reusing plastic waste that is already in Hawaii, we can reduce the environmental and economic impacts of transporting waste plastics from the islands, incinerating it or dumping it in Hawaii's overflowing landfills."
From Science Daily ● Jun. 28, 2026
After all, the “Toy Story” franchise has had pure villains before — one of them almost got away with incinerating the toys for good!
From Salon ● Jun. 21, 2026
Japan does relatively well on generating electricity by incinerating trash, too.
From Barron's ● Mar. 25, 2026
It was also the world’s biggest bird fryer, incinerating thousands of birds a year.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 17, 2025
“You can’t go around incinerating every hero. Besides, he’s brave. I like that.”
From "The Last Olympian" by Rick Riordan
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.
