explicate
Americanverb (used with object)
-
to make plain or clear; explain; interpret.
-
to develop (a principle, theory, etc.).
verb
-
to make clear or explicit; explain
-
to formulate or develop (a theory, hypothesis, etc)
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
-
explicatornoun
-
reexplicateverb (used with object)
-
explicativeadjective
-
unexplicatedadjective
-
well-explicatedadjective
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
explicatesimple
-
explicatessimple
-
have explicatedperfect
-
has explicatedperfect
-
am explicatingprogressive
-
are explicatingprogressive
-
is explicatingprogressive
-
have been explicatingperfect progressive
-
has been explicatingperfect progressive
Past
-
explicatedsimple
-
had explicatedperfect
-
was explicatingprogressive
-
were explicatingprogressive
-
had been explicatingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of explicate
1525–35; < Latin explicātus unfolded, set forth, past participle of explicāre, equivalent to ex- ex- 1 + plicāre to fold; see -ate 1
Explanation
To explicate is to explain or interpret something, maybe putting it in plain terms to make it more comprehensible for others. It might help to remember that it begins with "ex-," like the word explain, which is similar in meaning. The verb explicate comes from the Latin explicāre, which means "to unfold or unravel." This is a good description of a word that means to explain something to make it clearer and more easily understandable. Think of a puzzle or mystery: when you solve it, you sometimes have to explicate how you arrived at the solution, telling how you used the clues given to find the answer.
Vocabulary lists containing explicate
The Vocabulary.com Top 1000
Looking to grow your vocabulary? Check out this interactive, curated word list from our team of English language specialists at Vocabulary.com – one of over 17,000 lists we've built to help learners worldwide!
ASVAB Word Knowledge
Interested in learning more words like this one? Our team at Vocabulary.com has got you covered! You can review flashcards, quiz yourself, practice spelling, and more – and it's all completely free to use!
Big Science
Want to remember this word for good? Start your learning journey today with our library of interactive, themed word lists built by the experts at Vocabulary.com – we'll help you make the most of your study time!
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:
In his 1998 book “Paradise Lost,” Schrag sought not simply to foretell the region’s future, but to explicate how its future foretold what was in store for the country as a whole.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 10, 2025
"But I do think it's fair to say the burden is on the firm to explicate and help develop appropriate guardrails to prevent nefarious uses."
From Science Daily ● May 2, 2024
Mind-scientists labor to explicate us, with theories ranging from Freudian psychoanalysis to neuro-evo-psycho-cognitive whatever.
From Scientific American ● Dec. 24, 2022
“This is an issue that is not going to be simple to explicate, excavate or decide,” said Commissioner Merryl H. Tisch, who suggested shelving the motion for further research.
From New York Times ● Oct. 18, 2021
This was a little unfortunate, the topic being one close to his lordship's heart and one he was inclined to explicate at some length.
From "The Remains of the Day" by Kazuo Ishiguro
No one understands, explicates and empathizes with mothers and daughters, love and pain, life and all it entails, quite like Ms. Hudes.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 12, 2025
On the Michelangelo side, “All Things Move” admirably explicates the art of the Sistine Chapel and the history of its moment.
From Washington Post ● Apr. 3, 2023
Joni Mitchell's song "Big Yellow Taxi" explicates this duality nicely: there is paradise, and there are parking lots, and never the twain shall meet.
From Salon ● Mar. 22, 2020
The author explicates Stone’s fiction and expands its context.
From New York Times ● Mar. 9, 2020
And among many other things, he ingeniously explicates the two contrary Motions of the Sun, from East to West, and vice versa, by one onely Motion upon a Spiral, turning about a Cone.
From Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society - Vol 1 - 1666 Giving some Accompt of the present Undertakings, Studies, and Labours of the Ingenious in many considerable parts of the World by Oldenburg, Henry
It’s never fully explicated in the screenplay, but Max’s mental health issues and possibly undiagnosed autism spectrum disorder are frequently alluded to, thrumming below the surface.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 30, 2024
“What really needs to be explicated is not the plain vanilla meaning of insurrection but the whole phrase — insurrection against the United States Constitution,” Delahunty testified on Friday.
From Seattle Times ● Nov. 3, 2023
“What really needs to be explicated is not the plain vanilla meaning of insurrection but the whole phrase - insurrection against the United States Constitution,” Delahunty testified on Friday.
From Washington Times ● Nov. 3, 2023
Women don’t really show up, except as robots, until the rise of the “It Girl” in Hollywood, a subject thoroughly explicated last year in a biography of her creator, Elinor Glyn.
From New York Times ● Jun. 25, 2023
Whether from this Principle the apparition of some new Stars may not be explicated?
From Micrographia Some Physiological Descriptions of Minute Bodies Made by Magnifying Glasses with Observations and Inquiries Thereupon by Hooke, Robert
Mr. Meslow does an excellent job explicating the ensuing tensions between ABC and the showrunners, which would ensure that the program was always a deeply flawed translation of its creators’ vision.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 17, 2026
But to physicists bent on explicating those fundamental laws, black holes are a Coney Island of mysteries and imagination.
From New York Times ● Oct. 10, 2022
Precious Auntie, devastated, leaves a sheath of papers for her daughter to read, explicating the sorrowful and somber truth of their generational legacy.
From Seattle Times ● May 31, 2022
You can help guide your three-man vessel by expressing your appreciatio, and explicating exactly how meaningful to you this time spent together is.
From Slate ● Aug. 12, 2019
In general, the Author makes it his study, for the explicating of the most perplext Difficulties, to shew, that Nature works not but by very simple and easie wayes.
From Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society - Vol 1 - 1666 Giving some Accompt of the present Undertakings, Studies, and Labours of the Ingenious in many considerable parts of the World by Oldenburg, Henry
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.
