coronavirus
Americannoun
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of coronavirus
First recorded in 1965–70; so called from the coronalike array of spikes projecting from the capsid
Compare meaning
How does coronavirus compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:
Explanation
A coronavirus is a specific type of microbe that can cause an infectious disease. One particular coronavirus, first identified in 2019, caused a worldwide pandemic. If you look at a coronavirus under a microscope, you'll see its round, spiky, crownlike shape. That's where this virus gets its name; corona means "crown" in Latin. People talked about coronaviruses a lot in 2020 because of Covid-19 (an acronym for coronavirus disease of 2019). But these viruses have been around for generations, and they're usually not so deadly. In fact, coronaviruses are responsible for the common cold, as well as illnesses affecting birds and non-human mammals.
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:
Levels of coronavirus in the wastewater in San José and Palo Alto are considered “high,” the Santa Clara County Public Health Department said.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 24, 2026
The consumer-price index sank 0.4% last month to mark the first drop since May 2020, when the coronavirus pandemic was in its early months and raging globally.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 14, 2026
Germany was "returning to the arrangements we had before the coronavirus pandemic," he told ARD TV on Thursday night.
From BBC ● Jul. 3, 2026
To investigate the process, researchers compared SARS-CoV-2 with RaTG13, a closely related coronavirus that infects bats but has not been known to infect humans.
From Science Daily ● Jun. 24, 2026
The rules were suspended during the coronavirus pandemic, and then again during the energy crisis that followed Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine -- both of which piled massive pressure on European nations' finances.
From Barron's ● Jun. 3, 2026
Rather than focusing on a single virus strain, the AI system analyzed genetic information from Sarbeco coronaviruses collected through surveillance programs worldwide.
From Science Daily ● Jun. 5, 2026
Before human testing began, animal studies showed the vaccine could generate strong immune responses against multiple coronaviruses.
From Science Daily ● Jun. 5, 2026
The vaccine was engineered to work on all coronaviruses which would include all Covid variants as well as viruses that currently infect animals yet have the potential to start the next pandemic.
From BBC ● Jun. 4, 2026
It wouldn’t be surprising, given that many viruses have been linked to bats, including the Ebola, Marburg, Nipah and Hendra viruses, as well as coronaviruses like SARS-1 and MERS.
From Salon ● Jan. 30, 2025
Raccoon dogs, masked palm civets, hoary bamboo rats and Malayan porcupines have transmitted bat coronaviruses before, the study authors noted.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 21, 2024
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.
