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• revolutionary
  revolutionary

  adjective

  of, pertaining to, characterized by, or of the nature of a revolution, or a sudden, complete, or marked change.
• Revolutionary
  Revolutionary

  adjective

  of or relating to the conflict or period of the War of American Independence (1775–83)

revolutionary

American  

[rev-uh-loo-shuh-ner-ee] / ˌrɛv əˈlu ʃəˌnɛr i /

adjective

1. 

   of, pertaining to, characterized by, or of the nature of a revolution, or a sudden, complete, or marked change.

   a revolutionary junta.

2. radically new or innovative; outside or beyond established procedure, principles, etc..

   a revolutionary discovery.

   Synonyms:

   unorthodox, drastic, novel, unprecedented

3. (initial capital letter) of or relating to the American Revolution or to the period contemporaneous with it in U.S. history.

   Revolutionary heroes; Revolutionary weapons.

4. revolving.

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noun

• revolutionaries
  plural

1. a revolutionist.

revolutionary ¹ British  

/ ˌrɛvəˈluːʃənərɪ /

noun

1. a person who advocates or engages in revolution

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adjective

1. relating to or characteristic of a revolution

2. advocating or engaged in revolution

3. radically new or different

   a revolutionary method of making plastics

4. rotating or revolving

Revolutionary ² British  

/ ˌrɛvəˈluːʃənərɪ /

adjective

1. of or relating to the conflict or period of the War of American Independence (1775–83)

2. of or relating to any of various other Revolutions, esp the Russian Revolution (1917) or the French Revolution (1789)

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Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• antirevolutionary
  noun
• revolutionariness
  noun
• nonrevolutionary
  adjective
• post-Revolutionary
  adjective
• prerevolutionary
  adjective
• prorevolutionary
  adjective
• semirevolutionary
  adjective
• ultrarevolutionary
  adjective
• unrevolutionary
  adjective
• revolutionarily
  adverb

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• revolutionaries
  plural

Etymology

Origin of revolutionary

First recorded in 1765–75; revolution + -ary

Explanation

A revolutionary person fearlessly advocates radical change. Revolutionary people and ideas challenge the status quo and might be violent or willing to upset the natural order to achieve their goals. Like the word revolve, it's all about turning things around. Revolutionary leaders want to change the world by any means necessary. Before he was the coolest face on a T-shirt, Che Guevara was ready to die for change in South America (and in fact, he did). You don't need to be violent to be revolutionary, just ask Gandhi and Rev. Martin Luther King. You don't even need to be political. Alexander McQueen, John Lennon, and Picasso could tell you that.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

revolutionary Revolutionary revolutionaries

The multidisciplinary artist rafa esparza was maybe 19 and in the break room of the now-defunct Orchard Supply Hardware in Pasadena when he first found out about the revolutionary art group Asco.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 2, 2026

“This is really going to be a revolutionary truck,” Musk said in a prerecorded video on Thursday.

From MarketWatch ● Sep. 25, 2026

The self-proclaimed revolutionary communist has since sent messages to supporters describing himself as a "prisoner of war".

From BBC ● Sep. 14, 2026

In Burma, the revered revolutionary figure Aung San warmed to Imperial Japan because it had helped create the Burma Independence Army.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 11, 2026

What one historian has called “the perishability of revolutionary time” meant that the political will to act was also racing against the clock.

From "Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation" by Joseph J. Ellis

The Isfahan Revolutionary Court dismissed his application to appeal and relatives were summoned for a final meeting.

From Barron's ● Oct. 7, 2026

The paramilitary Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps continues to attack ships around the Strait of Hormuz, the narrow mouth of the Persian Gulf that had been the gateway for about a fifth of the world’s oil.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 26, 2026

During the unrest around the square, two people died: a member of the Revolutionary Guard and a homeless man.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 19, 2026

The Revolutionary Guards said the vessel, Sidr, caught fire after hitting a naval mine.

From BBC ● Sep. 15, 2026

There were several Red Guard Committee members and key people from the propaganda group, along with several members of the Revolutionary Performance Team and the Mao Ze-dong Thought Study Group.

From "Red Scarf Girl: A Memoir of the Cultural Revolution" by Ji-li Jiang

Skopje is a city of statues, two or three hundred of them apparently, great big things in squares and in fountains commemorating tsars and dames, emperors and warriors, royalty and revolutionaries.

From BBC ● Oct. 3, 2026

Crisscrossing Europe in search of fellow revolutionaries, he thrilled to the antibourgeois and antimonarchist uprisings in Paris, Rome and other cities in 1848.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 4, 2026

“O Canada” is as soaring as “God Save the King,” while revolutionaries across the world have chanted “La Marseillaise” for centuries.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 25, 2026

Americans, who usually think the world revolves around economics, consistently misapprehend how revolutionaries embrace tumult.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 23, 2026

No, people don’t, because they’re not revolutionaries like us.

From "I'll Give You the Sun" by Jandy Nelson

Related Words

• contemporary
• innovative
• modern
• radical