ingredient
Americannoun
-
something that enters as an element into a mixture.
Flour, eggs, and sugar are the main ingredients in the cake.
-
a constituent element of anything; component.
the ingredients of political success.
noun
Synonym Usage
See element.
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of ingredient
First recorded in 1425–75; late Middle English from Latin ingredient- (stem of ingrediēns ), present participle of ingredī “to go or step into, commence,” equivalent to in- in- 2 + -gredient- “going”; see gradient
Explanation
An ingredient is one part of a mixture. For example, if you're making chocolate chip cookies, flour is just one ingredient you'll need. Ingredient comes from the Latin word ingredientem, meaning "that which enters into." It's not just for cookies. If you're in the lab mixing a chemical compound, you carefully add one ingredient after the next and record the results (and hope nothing blows up). It's also an element or factor of something, such as how that song you wrote has all the ingredients to be a sure-fire hit! Remember that it ends in -ent, since often what you Eat has ingrediEnts.
Vocabulary lists containing ingredient
Selection Vocabulary 1, Unit 1
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National Cookie Day
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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.
It’s the first ingredient in what I believe is television’s saddest picnic — and one of its most beautiful meals.
From Salon • Jun. 30, 2026
Since then, he and roughly 170,000 other users have been diagnosed with non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma and related cancers associated with extended exposure to glyphosate, Roundup’s key ingredient and a probable carcinogen.
From Slate • Jun. 25, 2026
Compared with Earth, Mars, and other rocky planets, angrites contain very little silicon dioxide, or silica, a key ingredient in nearly every known terrestrial planet.
From Science Daily • Jun. 23, 2026
"It's a very, very natural basic ingredient that's essential to the full enjoyment of life."
From BBC • Jun. 22, 2026
That was the year corn first became an ingredient in Coca-Cola.
From "The Omnivore's Dilemma" by Michael Pollan
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.
