adjective
-
liable to catch fire; flammable
-
readily aroused to anger or passion
noun
Commonly Confused
Inflammable and flammable both mean “combustible.” Inflammable is the older by about 200 years. Flammable now has certain technical uses, particularly as a warning on vehicles carrying combustible materials, because of a belief that some might interpret the intensive prefix in- of inflammable as a negative prefix and thus think the word means “noncombustible.” Inflammable is the word more usually used in nontechnical and figurative contexts: The speaker ignited the inflammable emotions of the crowd.
Other Word Forms
- inflammability noun
- inflammableness noun
- inflammably adverb
- noninflammability noun
- noninflammable adjective
- noninflammableness noun
- noninflammably adverb
- uninflammability noun
- uninflammable adjective
Etymology
Origin of inflammable
1595–1605; < Medieval Latin inflammābilis, equivalent to Latin inflammā ( re ) to inflame + -bilis -ble
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.
Many in Iran are blaming the authorities for incompetence and worse, asking: How could so much inflammable material apparently be left on the port without due care?
From BBC • Apr. 27, 2025
In addition, they contain no easily inflammable liquids.
From Science Daily • Oct. 23, 2023
But on Jan. 8, 1931, the inflammable pile was dynamited, making room for King County Hospital, now Harborview Medical Center.
From Seattle Times • May 11, 2023
“This is not normal, of course. This is a very volatile, very inflammable situation,” said Artyom Shraibman, founder of Sense Analytics and a Belarus analyst with the Carnegie Moscow Center think tank.
From Washington Post • Nov. 17, 2021
Adams let out the word that Jefferson was clearly the voters’ choice and the superior man, that Burr was “like a balloon, filled with inflammable air.”
From "Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation" by Joseph J. Ellis
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.
