middle-aged

American  

[mid-l-eyjd] / ˈmɪd lˈeɪdʒd /

adjective

1. being of the age intermediate between youth and old age, roughly between 45 and 65.

2. characteristic of or suitable for persons of this age.

---

middle-aged British  

adjective

1. of, relating to, or being in the time in a person's life between youth and old age

---

Other Word Forms

• middle-agedly adverb
• middle-agedness noun

Etymology

Origin of middle-aged

First recorded in 1600–10

Example Sentences

“Rooster,” on the other hand, is the story of an analog middle-aged man, Steve Carell’s Greg Russo, who has much in common with Lawrence’s other better-loved heroes.

From Salon • Apr. 5, 2026

The recommendation applies particularly to middle-aged people—men over 40 and women over 45.

From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 30, 2026

Using machine learning models, the researchers showed that only a few days of behavioral data from middle-aged fish were enough to estimate lifespan.

From Science Daily • Mar. 26, 2026

Her biographer, Mark Oppenheimer, is a middle-aged father of five.

From Los Angeles Times • Mar. 10, 2026

Richard envisaged somebody young and alert like their houseboy, Ugwu, but Harrison turned out to be a small stooped stick of a man, middle-aged, wearing an oversize white shirt that stopped below his knees.

From "Half of a Yellow Sun" by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie