intermingle
Americanverb (used with or without object)
-
intermingles,
present (3rd person singular)
-
intermingled,
past participle, past
-
intermingling
present participle
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
interminglesimple
-
interminglessimple
-
have intermingledperfect
-
has intermingledperfect
-
am interminglingprogressive
-
are interminglingprogressive
-
is interminglingprogressive
-
have been interminglingperfect progressive
-
has been interminglingperfect progressive
Past
-
intermingledsimple
-
had intermingledperfect
-
was interminglingprogressive
-
were interminglingprogressive
-
had been interminglingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of intermingle
late Middle English word dating back to 1425–75; see origin at inter-, mingle
Explanation
Things that intermingle get mixed up with each other. Tall grasses and daisies might intermingle in your parents' backyard, but your parents may choose not to intermingle with their neighbors. When kids from diverse backgrounds intermingle in school, they learn more about people who are different from themselves, and when several different flavors intermingle successfully in a recipe, the taste is complex and delicious. Intermingle intermingles the prefix inter-, "among or between" and mingle, from the Middle English myngen, "to mix," from a Proto-Germanic root meaning "to knead together."
Vocabulary lists containing intermingle
Inside Out & Back Again
Looking to grow your vocabulary? Check out this interactive, curated word list from our team of English language specialists at Vocabulary.com – one of over 17,000 lists we've built to help learners worldwide!
Novel Study: Inside Out & Back Again, Unpack and Repack–1976: The Year of the Dragon
Interested in learning more words like this one? Our team at Vocabulary.com has got you covered! You can review flashcards, quiz yourself, practice spelling, and more – and it's all completely free to use!
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:
In so doing, we may one day generate forests of trees whose ancestry does not intermingle with that of the species generated by the historic evolutionary process.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 26, 2025
Dr Lakdawala says if H5N1 becomes established in humans, it could re-assort - or intermingle - with existing strains, amplifying its public-health impact.
From BBC ● Dec. 17, 2025
The communities on either side are often from the same ethnic groups and intermingle, and herds of cattle migrate across the vast savannah.
From Barron's ● Oct. 20, 2025
“We felt value in having everyone in the office at least one day a week because it brought younger team members to intermingle and collaborate with seasoned members,” he said.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 4, 2024
I look back and see the way our footsteps intermingle to form a single path.
From "Every Day" by David Levithan
He intermingles the bones of infected and non-infected alike, he says, “because they are alike.”
From Salon ● Jan. 23, 2026
The wallpaper playfully intermingles late-Georgian-style silhouettes of Ward and her beloved oversize insects.
From Seattle Times ● Jul. 26, 2023
The wildland-urban interface — where human development intermingles with wild places such as forests, grasslands and scrublands — is the fastest-growing land-use type in the United States.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 25, 2021
A gardener and poet’s ode to that pesky burrowing mammal intermingles with a rumination on his own life and a reminder that all nature is wondrous.
From Washington Post ● Nov. 19, 2019
But no separate line of action, adventure, or enjoyment runs through and intermingles with the even course of Virgil’s poetic career.
From The Roman Poets of the Augustan Age: Virgil by W. Y. Sellar
She prefers to swap pieces with friends and her pieces are intermingled with many gifts from other people.
From BBC ● Jul. 17, 2026
Within this large group, cliques were formed but they often intermingled and share territory, like something from a simian Pixar film.
From Salon ● Apr. 23, 2026
Many Alexandrians are feeling the loss, intermingled with their other most treasured heritage.
From Barron's ● Feb. 25, 2026
Several soldiers sketched in my notebook a new geography of the battlefield, marking dots to represent Ukrainian and Russian positions intermingled within the kill zone.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 5, 2025
In countries with a very cold winter, two decidedly non-Christian elements tended to be intermingled, somewhat perplexingly, with the carol form.
From "The Story of Music" by Howard Goodall
In Latin America, as Hayes-Bautista explained, after centuries of Indigenous and Spanish intermingling, racial and ethnic lines were fluid, with myriad, subtle gradations of color, lineage and heritage.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 2, 2026
There are more than 250 ethnic groups in Nigeria, which is roughly divided into a mainly Muslim north, a largely Christian south, with intermingling in the middle.
From BBC ● Feb. 4, 2026
Nearby, I pulled into King Tacos to sample a peculiar hybrid cuisine born out of the long intermingling of American, Japanese and Okinawan culinary traditions.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 25, 2025
The third-act turn into a 21st century “Oleanna” is effective, with Bartlett inventively intermingling her levels of fiction and cleanly visualizing the inevitable he said/she said conflicts.
From New York Times ● May 15, 2024
“But no one looked at the effects of these new species intermingling with native populations? That’s the danger, isn’t it?”
From "The Adoration of Jenna Fox" by Mary E. Pearson
Random Word
Spin the wheel and learn a new word!
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.
