Synonyms

mitigate

American

[mit-i-geyt] / ˈmɪt ɪˌgeɪt /

verb (used with object)

to lessen in force or intensity, as wrath, grief, harshness, or pain; moderate.
to make less severe.

to mitigate a punishment.
to reduce the risk or impact of harmful conditions or events.

To mitigate flood damage, new building regulations are being developed.
to make (a person, one's state of mind, disposition, etc.) milder or more gentle; mollify; appease.
Environmental Science. to restore or recreate (a habitat) in order to make up for losses due to development or agriculture.

No one has tried anything on this scale before to mitigate the grasslands bird habitat.

verb (used without object)

to become milder; lessen in severity.

mitigate British

/ ˈmɪtɪˌɡeɪt /

verb

to make or become less severe or harsh; moderate

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Usage

Mitigate is sometimes wrongly used where militate is meant: his behaviour militates (not mitigates ) against his chances of promotion

Commonly Confused

Mitigate, whose central meaning is “to lessen” or “to make less severe,” is sometimes confused with militate, which means “to have effect or influence; weigh on.” This mix-up often occurs in the use of the phrase mitigate against, as follows: This criticism in no way mitigates (read militates ) against your going ahead with your research. Although this use of mitigate occasionally occurs in edited writing, it is rare and is widely regarded as an error.

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

Inflected Forms

Participles

Conjugated Forms

Present

Past

Future

Etymology

Origin of mitigate

First recorded in 1375–1425; late Middle English mitigaten, from Latin mītigātus (past participle of mītigāre “to calm, soften, soothe”), equivalent to mīt(is) “mild, soft, gentle” + -ig- (combining form of agere “to do, cause to do, make”) + -ātus verb suffix; see -ate ¹

Explanation

Choose the verb mitigate when something lessens the unpleasantness of a situation. You can mitigate your parents' anger by telling them you were late to dinner because you were helping your elderly neighbor. The somewhat formal verb mitigate comes from the Latin roots mītis, "soft," and agere, "to do/act," which add up to "to soften." It is often used with words that indicate an outcome or something harmful. When you buy car insurance, you are trying to mitigate the risks involved with driving. Sunscreen is used to mitigate the effects of the sun on your skin.

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Vocabulary lists containing mitigate

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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:

mitigate mitigates mitigated mitigating

TotalEnergies says "strict measures have been taken to avoid, mitigate and offset" the impact on local environments and that it has compensated 99 percent of displaced households.

From Barron's ● Sep. 2, 2026

To mitigate natural-disaster risk, Superior bought timberland in other states, but market forces have been hard to outflank.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 28, 2026

To mitigate the risk, it’s best to have money set aside in a liquid account that you can use without having to tap into your retirement investments.

From MarketWatch ● Aug. 26, 2026

"Urgent adaptations are needed to mitigate the effects of successive heatwaves on plants and the insects that rely on them to thrive," the society said.

From BBC ● Aug. 21, 2026

The best I could hope to do was mitigate the disaster.

From "We Are the Ants" by Shaun David Hutchinson

“The company expects inventory levels to remain elevated as it mitigates this dynamic supply chain environment,” the company said.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 5, 2026

Moore said the facility has remained at 45 degrees, which mitigates the risk of it becoming a biohazard due to food spoilage.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 21, 2026

While China relies on oil imports, "it mitigates this exposure through diversified suppliers, ties with Iran, substantial strategic reserves and continued reliance on coal", she said.

From Barron's ● Apr. 14, 2026

But he added that the products Arm designs for that part of the market come with “dramatically smaller royalties,” which mitigates the potential impact on Arm’s business.

From MarketWatch ● Feb. 4, 2026

There is a consideration that mitigates the complication, and renders the task of unravelling it not altogether hopeless.

From Logic, Inductive and Deductive by William Minto

“Bears don’t like conflict. They like it easy. So the livestock issue, while fear is a real response if you are a livestock producer, can be mitigated … that’s not a deal breaker.”

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 13, 2026

“Rising component costs are mitigated given Apple’s bargaining power against consumers and the supply chain.”

From MarketWatch ● Jul. 14, 2026

The attention economy is often portrayed helpfully by media outlets as an individual problem to be mitigated by reducing our own dependence on screens and devices.

From Salon ● Jul. 13, 2026

The impact on European security could be mitigated by U.S. troop deployments elsewhere.

From The Wall Street Journal ● May 25, 2026

The first officers, on the other hand, were talking to their boss, and so they overwhelmingly chose the most mitigated alternative.

From "Outliers" by Malcolm Gladwell

"The limited extension during this period makes a temporary contribution to mitigating the exposure of the electricity system and Spanish consumers to previously unforeseen price spikes," said the announcement.

From Barron's ● Aug. 14, 2026

Abatzoglou hypothesized the region’s link between wildfires and soil moisture could cause the mitigating effects of the preceding El Niño to linger longer.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 22, 2026

The TD Cowen analysts also noted that the two reports this week said the items that won’t be served were toppings, rather than Taco Bell’s core menu items, thus mitigating the risk to sales.

From MarketWatch ● Jul. 9, 2026

He said Ansreen had been a "central figure" in the plot and had "many opportunities to stop the escalation of events", adding that mitigating circumstances had been "adequately taken into consideration".

From BBC ● Jul. 3, 2026

None of this compelling mitigating evidence was presented at trial, and it should have been.

From "Just Mercy" by Bryan Stevenson

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023