imitate
Americanverb (used with object)
-
imitates,
present (3rd person singular)
-
imitated,
past participle, past
-
imitating
present participle
-
to follow or endeavor to follow as a model or example.
to imitate an author's style; to imitate an older brother.
-
to mimic; impersonate.
The students imitated the teacher behind her back.
-
to make a copy of; reproduce closely.
-
to have or assume the appearance of; simulate; resemble.
verb
-
to try to follow the manner, style, character, etc, of or take as a model
many writers imitated the language of Shakespeare
-
to pretend to be or to impersonate, esp for humour; mimic
-
to make a copy or reproduction of; duplicate; counterfeit
-
to make or be like; resemble or simulate
her achievements in politics imitated her earlier successes in business
Synonym Usage
Imitate, copy, duplicate, reproduce all mean to follow or try to follow an example or pattern. Imitate is the general word for the idea: to imitate someone's handwriting, behavior. To copy is to make a fairly exact imitation of an original creation: to copy a sentence, a dress, a picture. To duplicate is to produce something that exactly resembles or corresponds to something else; both may be originals: to duplicate the terms of two contracts. To reproduce is to make a likeness or reconstruction of an original: to reproduce a 16th-century theater.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
-
imitabilitynoun
-
imitatornoun
-
overimitateverb (used with object)
-
preimitateverb (used with object)
-
imitableadjective
-
nonimitatingadjective
-
unimitatedadjective
-
unimitatingadjective
-
well-imitatedadjective
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
imitatesimple
-
imitatessimple
-
have imitatedperfect
-
has imitatedperfect
-
am imitatingprogressive
-
are imitatingprogressive
-
is imitatingprogressive
-
have been imitatingperfect progressive
-
has been imitatingperfect progressive
Past
-
imitatedsimple
-
had imitatedperfect
-
was imitatingprogressive
-
were imitatingprogressive
-
had been imitatingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of imitate
First recorded in 1525–35; from Latin imitātus, past participle of imitārī “to copy,” presumably a frequentative akin to the base of imāgō image
Explanation
When you imitate someone, you copy them. Youth marketers capitalize on kids' desire to imitate––tweens imitate teens, teens imitate young adults, and marketers supply the product lines to make it easy. Humans learn by imitating others. Babies carefully watch their caregivers' lips, learning to imitate the movements they make to create language sounds. Writers often begin their careers imitating the style of older writers they admire.
Vocabulary lists containing imitate
Jim Burke's Academic Vocabulary List
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!
The Watsons Go to Birmingham
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!
List 11
Want to remember this word for good? Start your learning journey today with our library of interactive, themed word lists built by the experts at Vocabulary.com – we'll help you make the most of your study time!
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:
"I don't want to imitate him but I try to resemble him," she said of her uncle.
From Barron's ● Sep. 27, 2026
Quantum simulators are especially useful for this kind of work because researchers can precisely control them and program them to imitate physical processes that occur at atomic and subatomic scales.
From Science Daily ● Sep. 26, 2026
“The goal shouldn’t be to simply imitate traditional film or television,” said von Schwarz.
From Slate ● Sep. 26, 2026
Meanwhile, Bentley addressed the challenge of luxury-EV sound by getting musicians to imitate the rumble of its V8 engines using traditional Western percussion instruments.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 23, 2026
She curled up on her side to imitate me, looking nothing at all like a snail.
From "The Science of Breakable Things" by Tae Keller
We’ll all find out together if, with the original stock market superstition, life actually imitates art.
From Barron's ● Mar. 13, 2026
Instead of copying part of a virus or bacterium, this new vaccine imitates the communication signals immune cells exchange during infection.
From Science Daily ● Feb. 23, 2026
On a recent test in Poland, a Polish air-defense crew flew a Merops at a target that imitates Shaheds but it missed.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 4, 2025
While AI-generated music is rife online, it's often released under fictitious names, or imitates big stars, but it doesn't normally appear on their official streaming pages.
From BBC ● Aug. 22, 2025
Herrmann’s orchestra imitates a swing band’s jazzy rhythms and brassy sound.
From "Spooked!" by Gail Jarrow
His habits, like those of Henry David Thoreau, were widely discussed but seldom imitated.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 23, 2026
Coltrane singlehandedly made the soprano saxophone the popular jazz instrument it is today, exceeding Sonny Rollins’s influence on tenor saxophone and replacing Charlie Parker as jazz’s most imitated saxophone player.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 11, 2026
Since 2013, Mboladinga has worn colourful suits and silently imitated a statue of revered revolutionary leader Patrice Lumumba, with one arm raised, for entire matches.
From BBC ● Jun. 28, 2026
Life imitated art when, in 2019, Van Der Beek fulfilled the prophecy foretold by a “Don’t Trust the B—” storyline and became a contestant on “Dancing With the Stars.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 12, 2026
Amanda Werner laughed her famous laugh, nearly as imitated as Buster’s.
From "Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?" by Philip K. Dick
"Triple threat. Go big or go home. Life imitating art."
From BBC ● Aug. 19, 2026
Later in the game, Cleveland’s José Ramírez was seen in the dugout apparently imitating Yan’s airborne style of rejoicing.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 6, 2026
The second is that a machine can demonstrate intelligence by successfully imitating a human in conversation, an idea that later became known as the Turing test.
From Science Daily ● Jul. 14, 2026
The song would only become even more synonymous with the president in 2022, when his hokey dance often done to the classic became so viral that athletes around the world began imitating it.
From Slate ● Jun. 11, 2026
He became so attached to his mistress that when she sleepwalked through the house the dog followed imitating her posture.
From "The House of the Spirits: A Novel" by Isabel Allende
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.
