suffuse
Americanverb (used with object)
-
suffuses,
present (3rd person singular)
-
suffused,
past participle, past
-
suffusing
present participle
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
suffusesimple
-
suffusessimple
-
have suffusedperfect
-
has suffusedperfect
-
am suffusingprogressive
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are suffusingprogressive
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is suffusingprogressive
-
have been suffusingperfect progressive
-
has been suffusingperfect progressive
Past
-
suffusedsimple
-
had suffusedperfect
-
was suffusingprogressive
-
were suffusingprogressive
-
had been suffusingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of suffuse
First recorded in 1580–90, suffuse is from the Latin word suffūsus (past participle of suffundere ). See suf-, fuse 2
Explanation
The verb suffuse means to spread and fill a space, like the way the smell of wildflowers might suffuse a meadow. Suffuse is a synonym for steep. Like tea whose flavor grows stronger the more it steeps, when you suffuse something it spreads throughout until an area is full, or even overly full. Another synonym, infuse, looks a lot like suffuse. Both words come from the Latin word fundere, which means "to pour."
Vocabulary lists containing suffuse
The Alchemist
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A Thousand Splendid Suns
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Song of Solomon
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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:
My guess: The benefits of AI for human decision-making will rapidly suffuse society, while the agent revolution—AIs free to act on their own—will be a lot slower in coming.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 8, 2026
Nonsurgical options like dermal fillers or fat grafting can suffuse depressions to create a more centered appearance.
From Slate ● Feb. 22, 2026
With each breath, we suffuse our bodies with oxygen-rich air that keeps our organs and tissues healthy and working properly -- and without oxygen, we can survive mere minutes.
From Science Daily ● Mar. 6, 2024
Baumbach runs with their children’s antic energy and lets it suffuse other parts of his film, animating even the story’s more difficult third part with humor and affection that reflect the book’s tone.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 30, 2022
The roses flamed up as though with a sudden passion from within; a new and profound significance seemed to suffuse the shining pages of the books.
From "Brave New World" by Aldous Huxley
Ms. Brown’s Erica tries to mediate the tension that suffuses the house, while Mr. Braithwaite’s Leni has a cool humor that also helps ease the fraught dynamic.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 12, 2026
Love suffuses “Pictures of Ghosts,” a cleareyed, deeply personal and formally inspired rumination on life, death, family, movies and those complicated, invariably haunted places we call home.
From New York Times ● Jan. 25, 2024
As the chicken roasts, the paste blends with the rendered fat from the skin and suffuses the meat with rich, complex flavors.
From Washington Times ● Oct. 3, 2023
But its pleasures and compensations lie not in plotty complications or some third-act twist, but in the humanity that suffuses an enterprise that is borne of obsession but achieves a form of transcendence.
From Washington Post ● Mar. 21, 2023
The heavenly spheres are slowly spinning in their places, making a music that suffuses the cosmos.
From "Zero: The Biography of a Dangerous Idea" by Charles Seife
It’s an airy scene, suffused with mystery and light.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 30, 2026
This exquisite writer has once again delivered an incandescent work of fiction — sweet, but never sentimental, infinitely wise and suffused with love.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 2, 2026
It flew in the face of the mantra of the “quiet professional” that suffused military culture, a kind of sober maturity that was critical to judicious use of deadly force.
From Slate ● Apr. 13, 2026
The pommel-horse shape is accented with pencil-thin metallic piping and soft, suffused light pools in the hollows.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 8, 2026
I was sensible of a growing revolt of the spirit that suffused the whole of my frame, which would no longer be stifled or mollified.
From "The Astonishing Life of Octavian Nothing, Traitor to the Nation, Volume I: The Pox Party" by M.T. Anderson
Shalit became a popular fixture in American households from the 1970s through to his retirement in 2010, stylistically standing out with his thick-framed spectacles, polkadot bowties and frizzed hair, suffusing his segments with pun-filled wordplay.
From BBC ● Jun. 13, 2026
As you chew, the cardamom bits send out little bolts of flavor, suffusing the cake with a lovely scent of spice.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 21, 2025
It is best eaten in a large bowl, the sauce suffusing each nook and cranny of the chicken and noodles.
From Salon ● Nov. 30, 2021
To those without a personal connection to depression, suffusing a film about the subject with color and sunlight could seem incongruous.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 27, 2021
Like an enraged beast, the furnace throbbed with heat, suffusing a red glare over everything.
From "Native Son" by Richard Wright
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.
