categorize
Americanverb (used with object)
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to arrange in categories or classes; classify.
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to describe by labeling or giving a name to; characterize.
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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categoristnoun
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categorizationnoun
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decategorizationnoun
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subcategorizationnoun
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decategorizeverb (used with object)
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miscategorizeverb (used with object)
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recategorizeverb (used with object)
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miscategorizedadjective
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uncategorizedadjective
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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categorizesimple
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categorizessimple
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have categorizedperfect
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has categorizedperfect
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am categorizingprogressive
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are categorizingprogressive
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is categorizingprogressive
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have been categorizingperfect progressive
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has been categorizingperfect progressive
Past
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categorizedsimple
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had categorizedperfect
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was categorizingprogressive
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were categorizingprogressive
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had been categorizingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of categorize
First recorded in 1695–1705; categor(y) + -ize
Explanation
If you decided to categorize your wardrobe, you could sort it by type (pants or shirts), or by color. To categorize is to put something into a category. When you think of categorizing things, imagine taking a pile of marbles and putting them into little boxes by color. You are sorting things by how they are alike. Scientists categorize animals and plants by their properties. Doctors categorize illnesses by whether they are caused by viruses or bacteria. In movies, high school students are often categorized as jocks, popular kids, troublemakers, and geeks.
Vocabulary lists containing categorize
Vocabulary of the Common Core
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Content Summary G.2: Regionalization
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Content Summary 5.1: Causes of the Atlantic Revolutions
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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:
Companies aren’t required to categorize perks, so reporters created a taxonomy of nine types of perks, including an “other” category.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 25, 2026
His particular brand of cultural fluency — a rapid-fire mix of food, fashion, basketball, politics and pop culture — is what made the “Gua Bao Bad Boy” impossible to categorize.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 1, 2026
There’s been little new science on the 19 peptides since the FDA’s 2023 decision to categorize them as unsafe.
From Salon ● Apr. 4, 2026
Apps like Rocket Money can link bank accounts, categorize spending habits and flag unused subscriptions.
From MarketWatch ● Mar. 31, 2026
And then there are some things—an orange life vest, that one long paddle, a pair of plastic goggles, a lantern with cracked glass—I don’t know how to categorize.
From "The Wrong Way Home" by Kate O’Shaughnessy
Just 16% of respondents expressed a state of confidence about their money, a separate bucket that the survey categorizes as financially “fulfilled.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 2, 2026
The ISU categorizes somersault-like jumps as “choreographic elements.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 12, 2026
Wall Street categorizes metals as precious, base/industrial, and maybe “other” for the weird ones.
From Barron's ● Dec. 26, 2025
The International Union for Conservation of Nature red list categorizes lions as vulnerable to extinction.
From Science Daily ● Nov. 22, 2025
Sister Miriam Joseph* categorizes the relation of the trivial arts as follows: logic is concerned with the thing-as-it-is-known; grammar is concerned with the thing-as-it-is-symbolized; rhetoric is concerned with the thing-as-it-is-communicated.
From "Words Like Loaded Pistols" by Sam Leith
Some companies didn’t disclose dollar figures for each individual perk; reporters generally categorized these aggregate amounts in “other.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 25, 2026
Teledyne, often categorized as an industrial-sensing company, is embedded in the counterdrone detection chain through systems already operational in active theaters.
From MarketWatch ● Jun. 29, 2026
SpaceX is set to join the Russell 1000 index after Friday’s close, categorized as 90.4% growth and 9.6% value.
From Barron's ● Jun. 26, 2026
A spokesperson for Booking.com says: "If a particular region can be categorized as disputed or impacted by conflict, we add information to our platform to help ensure that travellers can make a well-informed choice."
From BBC ● May 24, 2026
Antisocial personality, though it described plenty of guys on R-and-W, seemed also to serve as a catchall for problem inmates who couldn’t otherwise be categorized.
From "Newjack: Guarding Sing Sing" by Ted Conover
Apps are great for tracking spending and automatically categorizing — making it easy to see that you spent this much more on food than clothes, or what you’re putting toward subscriptions.
From MarketWatch ● May 14, 2026
Agencies must submit “contingency plans” categorizing which employees are essential on a standardized worksheet.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 15, 2025
That's the lower limit of categorizing objects on the Torino Scale.
From Salon ● Mar. 3, 2025
During early assessments of impact risk, Apophis reached a rating of Torino Scale 4, which is a scale for categorizing potential Earth impact events.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 19, 2025
Children can explore the timbre, production, and material of the instruments to come up with their own ways of categorizing them.
From "Music and the Child" by Natalie Sarrazin
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.
