experience
Americannoun
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experiences
plural
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a particular instance of personally encountering or undergoing something.
My encounter with the bear in the woods was a frightening experience.
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the process or fact of personally observing, encountering, or undergoing something.
business experience.
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the observing, encountering, or undergoing of things generally as they occur in the course of time.
to learn from experience; the range of human experience.
-
knowledge or practical wisdom gained from what one has observed, encountered, or undergone.
a man of experience.
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Philosophy. the totality of the cognitions given by perception; all that is perceived, understood, and remembered.
verb (used with object)
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experiences,
present (3rd person singular)
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experienced,
past participle, past
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experiencing
present participle
idioms
noun
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direct personal participation or observation; actual knowledge or contact
experience of prison life
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a particular incident, feeling, etc, that a person has undergone
an experience to remember
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accumulated knowledge, esp of practical matters
a man of experience
-
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the totality of characteristics, both past and present, that make up the particular quality of a person, place, or people
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the impact made on an individual by the culture of a people, nation, etc
the American experience
-
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philosophy
-
the content of a perception regarded as independent of whether the apparent object actually exists Compare sense datum
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the faculty by which a person acquires knowledge of contingent facts about the world, as contrasted with reason
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the totality of a person's perceptions, feelings, and memories
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verb
-
to participate in or undergo
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to be emotionally or aesthetically moved by; feel
to experience beauty
Usage
What is another way to say experience? To experience something is to meet with it or feel it firsthand. How is experience different from undergo? Find out on Thesaurus.com.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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preexperiencenoun
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reexperienceverb
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experienceableadjective
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experiencelessadjective
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postexperienceadjective
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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experiencesimple
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experiencessimple
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have experiencedperfect
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has experiencedperfect
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am experiencingprogressive
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are experiencingprogressive
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is experiencingprogressive
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have been experiencingperfect progressive
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has been experiencingperfect progressive
Past
-
experiencedsimple
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had experiencedperfect
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was experiencingprogressive
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were experiencingprogressive
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had been experiencingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of experience
First recorded in 1350–1400; Middle English, Middle French, from Latin experientia, equivalent to experient- (stem of experiēns, past participle of experīrī “to try, test”; see ex- 1, peril) + -ia noun suffix; see -ence
Explanation
If you experience something, you go through an unusual or exciting event. If you're experiencing the world's loopiest roller coaster, you'd better hope that the amusement park doesn't experience a power outage. Sometimes experience means accumulated knowledge and sometimes it refers to a single spectacular event. If you have experience in cooking, you have worked in a restaurant before. Learning by experience is a method of acquiring knowledge by doing and not by reading. On the other hand, when you come back from summer camp, your mom will want to hear about your experiences. And white-water rafting is quite an unforgettable experience.
Vocabulary lists containing experience
"Seventh Grade" by Gary Soto
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Michelle Obama's Speech at the 2016 DNC
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Schooled
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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:
The near-death experience has helped put football into perspective too.
From BBC ● Sep. 13, 2026
Whether it’s “ba-dee-yah” or “ah-OOO-uh” or “na-na-na,” melding your voice with your neighbors’ can be the loveliest, most human experience around.
From Salon ● Sep. 13, 2026
“An experience like this reminds you just how precious life is,” Tiffany said.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 13, 2026
In a horror movie pastiche, Mendoza is dogged by middle-aged white men compelled to tell him that their wife is Asian, which does sound like something from personal experience.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 12, 2026
“In my experience, Shards take on some personality traits that were especially strong in Asase. Some were nurturing. Others, selfless. But you … you’re just stubborn.”
From "Kwame Crashes the Underworld" by Craig Kofi Farmer
One person might describe feeling unusually cold, another might mention constant chills, while a clinician could categorize those experiences using a specific medical term.
From Science Daily ● Sep. 13, 2026
A spokesperson for the Ascension Seton hospitals said in a statement, “When a patient experiences a serious or life-threatening condition during pregnancy, our clinicians provide medically indicated treatment, including treatment for an ectopic pregnancy.”
From Salon ● Sep. 13, 2026
What the family knows is in line with experiences of others who went through residential surveillance, including the small, windowless room lighted 24 hours a day with only a bed and a toilet.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 13, 2026
It's an innovation which has made me reflect on my own experiences of pregnancy and parenting.
From BBC ● Sep. 12, 2026
Experimentum was, as a consequence, the word generally used by medieval philosophers to describe artificially Constructed experiences.
From "The Invention of Science" by David Wootton
"Martin is experienced enough that it should be fine at the political level. The big uncertainty is President Connolly," Eoin O'Malley, a political scientist at Dublin City University, told AFP.
From Barron's ● Sep. 12, 2026
Francesca Rispoli, co-president of the anti-mafia organisation Libera, said the death highlighted the struggle experienced by many who break with organised crime.
From BBC ● Sep. 11, 2026
By comparison, mice receiving engineered T cells made from mature donor cells experienced only partial tumor control and developed graft-versus-host disease.
From Science Daily ● Sep. 11, 2026
But after the heartbreak she’s experienced, Sally’s had enough.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 11, 2026
The driver had mentioned that there weren’t four seasons in this region the way they experienced in New York, and Danny was grateful the people of the hotel had extra wool blankets for them.
From "The Way to Rio Luna" by Zoraida Cordova
To see if more women with ectopic pregnancies are experiencing severe health outcomes, ProPublica analyzed hospital data from Texas, the most populous state to ban abortion.
From Salon ● Sep. 13, 2026
Though the government announced last month that it would shorten the work day for public sector employees to ease the electricity crisis, several parts of Caracas have begun experiencing power cuts.
From Barron's ● Sep. 12, 2026
People experiencing more complicated gastrointestinal symptoms could also benefit from support from a dietitian or gastroenterologist.
From Science Daily ● Sep. 11, 2026
In nearly three years since the brutal attack on Israel, American Jews have been experiencing unprecedented trauma and despair, with escalating antisemitism around the world and across our own country.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 10, 2026
She was experiencing a version of Weep that existed only in this dreamer’s mind.
From "Strange the Dreamer" by Laini Taylor
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.
