predominate
Americanverb (used without object)
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to be the stronger or leading element or force.
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to have numerical superiority or advantage.
The radicals predominate in the new legislature.
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to surpass others in authority or influence; be preeminent.
He predominated in the political scene.
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to have or exert controlling power (often followed byover ).
Good sense predominated over the impulse to fight.
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to appear more noticeable or imposing than something else.
Blues and greens predominated in the painting.
verb (used with object)
verb
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to have power, influence, or control
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(intr) to prevail or preponderate
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rare (tr) to dominate or have control over
adjective
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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predominatesimple
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predominatessimple
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have predominatedperfect
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has predominatedperfect
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am predominatingprogressive
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are predominatingprogressive
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is predominatingprogressive
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have been predominatingperfect progressive
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has been predominatingperfect progressive
Past
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predominatedsimple
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had predominatedperfect
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was predominatingprogressive
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were predominatingprogressive
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had been predominatingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of predominate
1585–95; < Medieval Latin praedominātus, past participle of praedominārī to predominate. See pre-, dominate
Explanation
Of all the social networks, one predominates. Facebook is by far the biggest and most influential. When someone or something predominates, it's the largest or most powerful of all. You'll probably already have noticed that the verb "dominate" makes up a good part of predominate, and in fact these are very similar words. To predominate means to be the biggest or most plentiful or most powerful of all. Of course, you want to make sure that you're talking about like things when you're using predominate. In the debate about guns, the most logical voices are rarely the ones that predominate.
Vocabulary lists containing predominate
"The Gift of the Magi"
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"Bonne Annee," Vocabulary from the personal essay
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George Washington's Farewell Address (1796)
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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:
Now as then, Hungarians, Poles and Czechs predominate.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 26, 2025
It's deliberately very soft, and the idea behind introducing it was to try to generate more pit stops, and force teams away from the one-stop strategies that predominate in F1 at the moment.
From BBC ● Sep. 23, 2025
The network effect has made RealPage the dominant player in the market at large, and especially so in cities and neighborhoods where big landlords predominate.
From Slate ● Sep. 10, 2024
"Owing to its high mutation rate, HIV exhibits remarkable genetic diversity, resulting in different viral subtypes; some of which predominate in particular regions of the globe," said Mann.
From Science Daily ● Mar. 26, 2024
Gradually, however, like Jekyll and Hyde, one personality began to predominate.
From "Kaffir Boy: An Autobiography" by Mark Mathabane
Like the earlier cut, “Chicago Boy,” a jazzy atmosphere predominates.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 27, 2026
As a result, the Nodal signal predominates there and the AVE population differentiates.
From Science Daily ● Jun. 18, 2024
In Yoruba culture, which predominates in the south-west of the country, twins are a blessing and their names are predestined.
From BBC ● May 9, 2024
The result is an architecture that’s intended to displace the carbon-heavy cinder-block design that predominates in fast-growing African cities, modern and vernacular at the same time.
From Slate ● Aug. 21, 2023
If the will is thus characterized at its birth, we can at once anticipate the conclusion that any will will be strong in proportion as the intellectual factor in it predominates.
From The Moral Instruction of Children by Adler, Felix
Skepticism predominated at the time, with Microsoft Chief Technology Officer Kevin Scott fearing OpenAI might "storm off to Amazon in a huff."
From Barron's ● May 11, 2026
“Next, looking to the record, we find virtually no evidence that race predominated in the voters’ enactment of the Proposition 50 Map.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 14, 2026
Though it may appear that optimism predominated throughout 2025, there were significant swings in sentiment.
From MarketWatch ● Jan. 6, 2026
Tom Vilsack said the agency was adopting an “ecologically-driven” approach to older forests — an arena where logging interests have historically predominated.
From Washington Times ● Dec. 19, 2023
He stopped; his voice was breaking, and I do not know if rage or terror predominated in my own heart.
From "Dracula" by Bram Stoker
Interpretations of Islamic law vary widely across the Muslim world, with more moderate strains predominating.
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 3, 2021
Now, with anxiety over what happens predominating, “That sort of thing is all gone.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 15, 2021
An opening scene in a secretarial pool has female employees chanting in unison—“I enclose an invoice for our services,” “I like your nails”—as the orchestra chatters and pulses around them, with high winds predominating.
From The New Yorker ● Oct. 29, 2018
Dozens of contractors, with about a half-dozen predominating, were paid about $800 million by the government to produce what was essentially half-finished garbage.
From Slate ● Nov. 20, 2014
Several persons were talking at once, and Victor’s voice was predominating, even over that of his mother.
From "The Awakening" by Kate Chopin
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.
