related
Americanadjective
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associated; connected.
- Synonyms:
- affiliated, relevant
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allied by nature, origin, kinship, marriage, etc.
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narrated, recounted, or told.
There were two eyewitnesses, but their related accounts were completely different.
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Music. (of chords, scales, or tones) having a close harmonic or melodic connection.
adjective
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connected; associated
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connected by kinship or marriage
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(in diatonic music) denoting or relating to a key that has notes in common with another key or keys
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Etymology
Origin of related
Explanation
Things are related when there's some connection or similarity between them. The fact that you caught a cold might be related to the fact that the kids you babysat sneezed and coughed all night long. People are related when they share a family connection, and other things are related by different kinds of connections. One poem is related to another if they come from the same school or movement of poetry, and a boy's dislike of baseball is probably related to the fact that his first coach yelled a lot. The verb relate is at the root of related, from the Latin relatus, "brought back."
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.
In California, language related to the internment of Japanese Americans at the Manzanar National Historic Site, as well as the history of Indigenous people in Death Valley and Muir Woods came under scrutiny.
From Los Angeles Times • Jun. 13, 2026
Montevidoni said investigators also found internet searches and web history related to Luigi Mangione, the suspect in the killing of UnitedHealthcare’s chief executive, on Rinderknecht’s devices.
From Los Angeles Times • Jun. 12, 2026
A Spotify spokeswoman said the company polices spam aggressively and has been removing content related to this attack for more than a year.
From The Wall Street Journal • Jun. 12, 2026
A related consideration is how monetary policy should interact with fiscal policy in an era of a structurally large federal deficit.
From Barron's • Jun. 12, 2026
“But for us it always felt like it was a way of declaring that Babs and Birdie were like family, even though we weren’t related by blood.”
From "The Wrong Way Home" by Kate O’Shaughnessy
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.
