The Oxford Wordpower Dictionary app allows you to search for words in English, and provides explanations of words in English with Arabic translations.
Type the English word you want in the Search box. As you start to type, the index underneath will show you a list of words from this part of the dictionary. Tap on the entry you want to look up.
If you type a word incorrectly in the Search box, a Did you mean? list will display. This list will suggest some words that you might have been trying to look up. Tap on a word from the list to open that entry.
Tap on the 'x' inside the search box to clear the search box, or in Settings set 'Clear the search box' to ON.
To see all words containing particular letters, you can do a wildcard search. For example, to see all words that begin with 'b' and end with 'g', search on b?g.
Tap the search mode button to the right of the Search box to switch between search modes. In Full Text search mode, the index displays results under headings:
Use the Back and Forward arrows on the top toolbar to move through entries that you have looked at, or tap the History button to the left of the Search box to see a list of all the words you have looked up. Tap on a word to look it up again. Tap on the Trash button within History to clear the History list.
Dictionary entries include some abbreviations and symbols. Look at this chart to see more information about what each one means.
If there is a word you do not understand in the entry you have looked up, tap on it to go to the dictionary entry for that word. Use the Back arrow on the top toolbar to return to the original entry.
You can swipe right or left to move to the next/previous entry in the dictionary, for example from the entry for pick verb, you can simply swipe right to see the entry for pick noun.
Pronunciation
To hear the pronunciation of a word, tap on the blue and red speaker symbols. The blue speaker symbol gives you British English pronunciation, and the red speaker symbol gives you American English pronunciation. The pronunciation is also given in phonetic symbols.
You can also record your voice and compare with the dictionary sound files - see Practise your pronunciation for more information.
There are hundreds of illustrations in the Oxford Wordpower Dictionary app, which will display when you look up a word. Tap on the illustration to see a bigger picture, often showing a group of related words. Pinch out the bigger picture to expand and explore it in more detail. Tap the device 'Back' button to return to the dictionary entry.
You will find usage notes at many dictionary entries. These give extra information about grammar, similar words, related vocabulary and other important usage information.
In verb entries, tapping on the 'Verb Forms' link will show the Present Simple, Past Simple, Past Participle and -ing forms of the verb. You can also hear the pronunciation of the different verb forms in British and American English by tapping on the blue and red speaker symbols. Tap the device 'Back' button to return to the dictionary entry.
Tap the device 'Back' button to return to the search pane.
Use these to move to the previous/next entry you looked up.
You can add the entry you are currently viewing to your Favourites list, or to a named folder within Favourites. Manage and view your Favourites from the Favourites tab at the bottom of the screen.
Switch between Full View and My View by tapping the 'moon' icon. This will allow you to see more of the entry screen at one time. Go to My View in Settings to choose which parts of the entry to hide, for example you can choose to hide the phonetics or pictures.
Tap the 'speech' icon in the top toolbar to practise your pronunciation.
Listen to British and American word forms by tapping the blue (British) and red (American) speaker icons.
Record your own voice speaking the words by tapping the 'Record' button. Tap this button again when you have finished, then again to listen to your own voice, which you can compare with the dictionary pronunciation.
With the Settings tab, you can change the way the dictionary text looks.
Here you can change the background colour, make the text size bigger or smaller, and choose options for clearing the search box and showing highlighted words when you do a Full Text Search.
My View: My View allows you to choose which parts of the dictionary entry are hidden when you tap the My View ('moon') icon on the top toolbar.
With the Favourites tab, you can view and manage your Favourite entries.
Favourite entries can be organized within Topic Folders to group connected entries together. You will find ten pre-loaded Topics ('Animals', 'Jobs', 'Sports', etc.), and you can create your own Folders to add your own Favourite entries to. You can also add entries to Favourites without assigning them to a particular Folder. Tap on a Folder to see the contents, and tap on an entry to see it again.
You can add new Folders and give each folder a different name so you can organize your vocabulary learning by tapping the icon in the top toolbar. You can delete whole folders or entries not assigned to Folders by tapping and holding on the folder or entry.
The following symbols are used in this dictionary:
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shows a British English audio file. Tap to hear the word spoken.
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shows an American English audio file. Tap to hear the word spoken.
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shows a word from the Oxford 3000™
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shows a cross reference to another related entry in the dictionary
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The following abbreviations are used in this dictionary:
abbrev | abbreviation |
adj | adjective |
adv | adverb |
Brit | British |
conj | conjunction |
det | determiner |
e.g. | for example |
etc. | and so on |
i.e. | in other words |
interj | interjection |
pl. | plural |
pp | past participle |
prep | preposition |
pres | present tense |
pron | pronoun |
pt | past tense |
sb | somebody |
sing. | singular |
sth | something |
US | American English |
3rd pers sing | third person singular |
Some entries contain a key symbol indicating that they are on the Oxford 3000™ list of important words. The keywords of the Oxford 3000 have been carefully chosen by a group of language experts and experienced teachers as the most important and useful words to learn in English. The selection is based on three criteria:
The words that are used most frequently are included, based on the information in the British National Corpus and the Oxford Corpus Collection. A corpus is an electronically held collection of written and spoken texts, often consisting of hundreds of millions of words. However, just being frequent in the corpus is not enough for a word to be chosen as a keyword. Some words may be used very frequently, but only in a limited area, such as in newspapers or scientific articles. In order to avoid including these restricted words, we include as keywords only those words that are frequent across a range of different types of texts. In other words, keywords are both frequent, and used in a variety of contexts.
In addition, the list also includes some important words that are very familiar to most users of English, even though they are not used very frequently. These include, for example, words for parts of the body, words used in travel, and words that are useful for explaining what you mean when you do not know the exact word for something. These words were identified by asking a group of experts in the fields of teaching and language study.
The words of the Oxford 3000 are marked in the dictionary with a key symbol.
The list covers British and American English. Some basic phrases are also included. Proper names (names of people, places, etc. beginning with a capital letter) are not included in the list. There is a full list of the Oxford 3000 on our dictionary website at www.oald8.com.
The phonetic symbols used in this dictionary are given below.
iː | see | /siː/ |
i | happy | /ˈhæpi/ |
ɪ | sit | /sɪt/ |
e | ten | /ten/ |
æ | hat | /hæt/ |
ɑː | arm | /ɑːm/ |
ɒ | got | /gɒt/ |
ɔː | saw | /sɔː/ |
ʊ | put | /pʊt/ |
uː | too | /tuː/ |
u | situation | /ˌsɪtʃuˈeɪʃn/ |
ʌ | cup | /kʌp/ |
ɜː | fur | /ˈfɜː(r)/ |
ə | ago | /əˈgəʊ/ |
eɪ | page | /peɪdʒ/ |
əʊ | home | /həʊm/ |
aɪ | five | /faɪv/ |
aʊ | now | /naʊ/ |
ɔɪ | join | /dʒɔɪn/ |
ɪə | near | /nɪə(r)/ |
eə | hair | /heə(r)/ |
ʊə | pure | /pjʊə(r)/ |
p | pen | /pen/ |
b | bad | /bæd/ |
t | tea | /tiː/ |
d | did | /dɪd/ |
k | cat | /kæt/ |
g | got | /gɒt/ |
tʃ | chin | /tʃɪn/ |
dʒ | June | /dʒuːn/ |
f | fall | /fɔːl/ |
v | voice | /vɔɪs/ |
ɵ | thin | /ɵɪn/ |
ð | then | /ðen/ |
s | so | /səʊ/ |
z | zoo | /zuː/ |
ʃ | she | /ʃiː/ |
ʒ | vision | /ˈvɪʒn/ |
h | how | /haʊ/ |
m | man | /mæn/ |
n | no | /nəʊ/ |
ŋ | sing | /sɪŋ/ |
l | leg | /leg/ |
r | red | /red/ |
j | yes | /jes/ |
w | wet | /ˈwet/ |
If two pronunciations for one word are given, both are acceptable. The first form is considered to be more common. A word that is pronounced very differently in American English has the American pronunciation given after a US label:
address /ə'dres; US 'ædres/
/ - / A hyphen is used in alternative pronunciations when only part of the pronunciation changes. The part that remains the same is replaced by a hyphen:
attitude /'ætɪtjuːd; US -tuːd/
/ ' / This mark shows that the syllable after it is said with more force (stress) than the other syllables in the word or group of words. For example:
any /'eni/ has a stress on the first syllable
depend /dɪ'pend/ has a stress on the second syllable.
/ ˌ / This mark shows that a syllable is said with more force than other syllables in a word but with a stress that is not as strong as for those syllables marked / ' /:
pronunciation /prəˌnʌnsiˈeɪʃn/ has the main stress on the syllable /ˈeɪ/ and the secondary stress on the syllable /ˌnʌn/.
(r) In spoken British English an r at the end of a written word (either as the final letter or in an -re ending, as in fire) is not sounded unless another word that begins with a vowel sound follows. For example, the r is not heard in His car was sold, but it is heard in His car isn't old. To show this, words which end in r or re have (r) at the end of the phonetic spelling in the dictionary:
car /kɑː(r)/
In American English the /r/ is sounded whenever it occurs in the spelling of a word.
Some very common words, e.g. an, as, that, of, have two or more pronunciations: a strong form and one or more weak forms. In speech, the weak forms are more common. For example, from is /frəm/ in He comes from Spain. The strong form occurs when the word comes at the end of a sentence or it is given special emphasis. For example, from is /frɒm/ in The ˌpresent's not 'from John, it's 'for him.
In compounds (made up of two or more words) the pronunciation of the individual words is not repeated. The dictionary shows how the compound is stressed by using the marks / ' / and / ˌ /. In 'tin opener, the stress is on the first word. In ˌjacket po'tato, the secondary stress is on the first syllable of jacket and the main stress is on the second syllable of potato.
Many derivatives are formed by adding a suffix at the end of a word. These are pronounced by simply saying the suffix after the word. For example, slowly /'sləʊli/ is said by joining the suffix -ly /li/ to the word slow /sləʊ/.
However, where there is doubt about how a derivative is pronounced, the phonetic spelling is given. The part that remains the same is represented by a hyphen:
mournful /-fl/; mournfully /-fəli/
-ance, -ence | /əns/ |
-er, -or | /ə(r)/ |
-ic | /ɪk/ |
-ics | /ɪks/ |
-ing | /ɪŋ/ |
-ish | /ɪʃ/ |
-ist | /ɪst/ |
-less | /ləs/ |
-ly | /li/ |
-ment | /mənt/ |
-ness | /nəs/ |
-ship | /ʃɪp/ |
-tion, -sion | /ʃən/ |
-y | /i/ |
The Grammar of Nouns
The Grammar of Verbs
Nouns can be countable, uncountable, singular, or plural.
Countable nouns are the most common type of nouns. They have a singluar form and a plural form:
An uncountable noun has only one form, not a separate singular and plural:
If an uncountable noun is the subject of a verb in English, the verb is singular:
With nouns such as furniture, information and equipment, you can talk about amounts of the thing or separate parts of the thing by using phrases like a piece of, three items of, etc.:
Some nouns are always plural and have no singular form. Nouns that refer to things that have two parts joined together, for example glasses, jeans, and scissors, are often plural nouns. You can usually also ask talk about a pair of jeans, a pair of scissors, etc.
Some plural nouns, such as police and cattle, look as if they are singular. Nouns like this usually refer to a group of people or animals of a particular type, when they are considered together as a unit. They also take a plural verb:
Some nouns are always singular and have no plural form. Many nouns like this can be used in only a limited number of ways. For example, some singular nouns must be or are often used with a particular determiner in front of them or with a particular preposition after them. The correct determiner or preposition is shown before the definition.
Transitive and Intransitive
Both of these sentences has a subject (he, she) and a verb (sigh, cut).
In the first sentence, sigh stands alone. Verbs like this are called intransitive.
In the second sentence, cut is transitive because it is used with an object (her hand).
In this dictionary, the grammatical codes I and T at the start of each meaning show you whether a verb is always transitive or always intransitive, or whether it can be sometimes transitive and sometimes intransitive.
An idiom is a phrase whose meaning is difficult or sometimes impossible to guess by looking at the meanings of the individual words it contains. For example, the phrase be in the same boat has a literal meaning that is easy to understand, but it also has a common idiomatic meaning:
Here, be in the same boat means "to be in the same difficult or unfortunate situation."
In this dictionary, idioms are given in a section near the end of an entry.
Phrasal verbs are verbs that consist of two, or sometimes three, words. The first word is a verb and it is followed by an adverb (turn down) or a preposition (eat into), or both (put up with). These adverbs or prepositions are sometimes called particles.
In this dictionary, phrasal verbs are listed at the end of the entry for the main verb. They are listed in alphabetical order of the particles following them.