undercurrent
Americannoun
-
a current that is not apparent at the surface or lies beneath another current
-
an opinion, emotion, etc, lying beneath apparent feeling or meaning
Usage
What is an undercurrent? An undercurrent is a flow of water or air that moves below the highest current or the surface. Undercurrent is more often used figuratively to mean a tendency underlying or at odds with what’s on the surface, as in While the two candidates smiled and shook hands, everyone in the room could feel the undercurrent of aggression between them. Example: The undercurrent at the beach today was so strong, I worried it was going to carry me out to sea!
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of undercurrent
Explanation
An undercurrent is a mood or atmosphere just below the surface, like the undercurrent of anxiety in your school during final exams. The figurative meaning of undercurrent is more common than its literal definition, "an ocean current that runs beneath the surface of the water." Another word for this kind of undercurrent is a "subsurface current." When most of us use the word undercurrent, however, we're talking about a general state of mind, something that subtly influences the way people feel, like the undercurrent of suspense running through a good horror movie.
Vocabulary lists containing undercurrent
"A Quilt of a Country," Vocabulary from the argument
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The Shining
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All My Sons
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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:
Photorealistic renderings of shrimp that resemble life preservers and chicken parts with the texture of dinosaur skin have elicited disgust and nausea, with an undercurrent of existential, eldritch horror.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 24, 2026
“But the undercurrent is always money and power.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 12, 2026
This is the drink I want after a long afternoon spent outside: effervescent and bright, but with an undercurrent of smoke and brine.
From Salon ● Jun. 9, 2026
A presumption that there is an undercurrent of simmering rage in day-to-day life has taken hold in ways that might have startled past generations.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 23, 2026
Other hobgoblins were the brainchildren of self-proclaimed experts who cooked up idiosyncratic theories of how language ought to behave, usually with a puritanical undercurrent in which people’s natural inclinations must be a form of dissoluteness.
From "The Sense of Style" by Steven Pinker
When I read it in high school, I wasn’t engaging with its undercurrents of racism, xenophobia, antisemitism, gender or sexuality in the way I do now.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 1, 2026
“In an eventual post-crisis world, a multi- polar environment lends itself to a much more gold-positive one. Additionally, many of the undercurrents that drove gold prices higher remain intact, albeit on pause,” he added.
From Barron's ● Jun. 10, 2026
"In an ocean you don't see undercurrents but local people know where the undercurrents are and where avalanches go off frequently. So please always talk with local people and listen to the avalanche forecast."
From BBC ● Feb. 19, 2026
Predictably, the novel’s twin undercurrents of pride and corruption surface with fatal consequences, and the lively narrative ends as fate demands that it must.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 13, 2026
Somehow during their aimless but oh-so-significant conversation with its delicious pauses and thrilling undercurrents of emotion, they came to know that they loved each other passionately.
From "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn" by Betty Smith
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.
