unmanned
Americanadjective
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without the physical presence of a person or people on board; uncrewed.
an unmanned spacecraft.
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Falconry. (of a captured hawk) untrained for hunting with a master; unmade.
adjective
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lacking personnel or crew
an unmanned ship
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(of aircraft, spacecraft, etc) operated by automatic or remote control
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uninhabited
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falconry (of a hawk or falcon) not yet trained to accept humans
Etymology
Origin of unmanned
First recorded in 1535–45; un- 1 ( def. ) + manned ( def. )
Explanation
Something that's unmanned doesn't have a driver, pilot, captain, or anyone else controlling or steering it. An unmanned space mission is launched without human passengers or crew. When a vehicle is unmanned, it's controlled from far away or by a robotic or autopilot system. Aerial vehicles like drones, surveillance planes, and spacecraft usually have cameras so that people on the ground can see what is happening nearby or beneath them. Other things are sometimes unmanned as well: "The reference desk was unmanned, so I couldn't ask my question."
Vocabulary lists containing unmanned
Tolkien Reading Day, List 9
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This Week in Words: Current Events Vocab for April 17–April 23, 2021
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"Going to the Moon"
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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.
The objects include unexploded ordnance, drones and other unmanned vehicles found washed ashore or floating at sea, it said.
From Barron's ● Oct. 5, 2026
In recent years, both nations have deployed semi-autonomous drones in combat and are rapidly racing toward fully autonomous unmanned aerial vehicles.
From Salon ● Sep. 24, 2026
The planned offering comes amid heightened investor interest in drone technology, with unmanned aerial vehicles dominating wars in Ukraine and the Middle East.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 23, 2026
They could then compare those results with lunar rocks returned to Earth from different locations by astronaut missions and unmanned spacecraft.
From Science Daily ● Sep. 12, 2026
But except for one or two enigmatic features, nothing of the sort is apparent in the exquisite profusion of Martian surface detail uncovered by unmanned spacecraft.
From "Cosmos" by Carl Sagan
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.
