individualize
Americanverb (used with object)
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to make individual or distinctive; give an individual or distinctive character to.
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to mention, indicate, or consider individually; specify; particularize.
verb
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to make or mark as individual or distinctive in character
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to consider or treat individually; particularize
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to make or modify so as to meet the special requirements of a person
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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individualizesimple
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individualizessimple
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have individualizedperfect
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has individualizedperfect
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am individualizingprogressive
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are individualizingprogressive
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is individualizingprogressive
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have been individualizingperfect progressive
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has been individualizingperfect progressive
Past
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individualizedsimple
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had individualizedperfect
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was individualizingprogressive
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were individualizingprogressive
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had been individualizingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of individualize
First recorded in 1630–40; individual + -ize
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:
Instead, they said, they have their own set of standards and individualize programming based on specific family needs and factors such as location and affordability.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 4, 2024
The researchers hope that the results of this study will help to identify elbow injuries in children who play baseball and to individualize treatment based on skeletal maturity.
From Science Daily ● Nov. 30, 2023
“It helps to humanize and individualize the vastness of the Holocaust and personalize history that is sometimes only communicated through statistics,” she added.
From Washington Post ● Dec. 16, 2022
“When you individualize and talk about individual stories, those stories are hard and very difficult,” Ms. Ardern told Newshub, a New Zealand news outlet, in February.
From New York Times ● Oct. 30, 2022
However, he who cannot individualize character must keep to the broader kinds of melodrama and farce, and above all to that last asylum of time-honored types—musical comedy.
From Dramatic Technique by Baker, George Pierce
Nanjiani individualizes and sells the familiar dynamic of being caught between two worlds, sympathizing with Banerjee before things turn ugly.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 22, 2022
The film invokes, individualizes, multiplies, takes apart and then wackily reassembles these enduring tropes.
From Washington Post ● May 4, 2022
It's the delivery that individualizes each, with tonal differences that make Gwen Stefani's take invigorating and upbeat where Mark Hollis' original has a doleful air.
From Salon ● Jan. 19, 2022
While golfers can provide launch monitor numbers as part of the interview process with Callaway’s Distance Fitting, Vrska said it is the one-on-one interaction that refines and individualizes the recommendations.
From Golf Digest ● May 8, 2020
The assumption of material form individualizes the idea.
From The Philosophy of Evolution Together With a Preliminary Essay on The Metaphysical Basis of Science by Carpenter, Stephen H. (Stephen Haskins)
“Ultimately, an individualized screening or monitoring process may be the safest approach, but we are still far from being able to precisely identify and intervene when an individual player may be at risk,” she said.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 7, 2026
It determined that companies were selling pricing and consumer-data tools to help retailers across various industries set individualized prices—a strong indication to some researchers that retailers were headed in that direction.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 3, 2026
General warrants and writs of assistance enraged the colonies precisely because they allowed British officials to rummage through homes and businesses without individualized suspicion.
From Slate ● May 20, 2026
Participants met to draft individualized, national transition roadmaps away from fossil fuels; using more laid back question and answer information sessions, they made unusual progress.
From Salon ● May 16, 2026
Gone was the desperate, urgent, intense feeling of being at home; rare was the experience of feeling myself individualized by family intimates.
From "Hunger of Memory" by Richard Rodriguez
“I think every single one of our routines, BJ did an incredible and phenomenal job of individualizing them.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 7, 2026
Walt Disney took his own liberties, experimentally drafting the raven-haired beauty as both a redhead and a blond, and individualizing the dwarfs.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 19, 2025
When the script doesn’t provide the individualizing details that transcend stereotypes, the performances do.
From New York Times ● Dec. 9, 2019
They do a good job of individualizing instruction and enrichment.
From Slate ● Feb. 14, 2019
Now individual matter, with all the individualizing accidents, is not included in the definition of the species.
From Summa Theologica, Part I (Prima Pars) From the Complete American Edition by Thomas, Aquinas, Saint
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.
