as in unconscious
lacking animate awareness or sensation
"pathetic fallacy" is the literary term for the ascription of human feelings or motives to inanimate natural elements
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Recent Examples of inanimate
Partners View all partners Tropical reefs might look like inanimate rock, but these colorful seascapes are built by tiny jellyfish-like animals called corals.
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Noam Vogt-Vincent, The Conversation, 6 June 2025
Of these performances, its is the most inanimate and yet evocative.
—Jackson McHenry, Vulture, 6 June 2025
Still, what separates living, breathing beings from inanimate matter remains frustratingly set in my mind.
—Elizabeth Rush, The Atlantic, 26 May 2025
Even an inanimate sculpture representing a Black woman gets hit with stereotypical projections.
—Taryn Finley, Refinery29, 14 May 2025
See All Example Sentences for inanimate
Recent Examples of Synonyms for inanimate
Adjective
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He was hospitalized, cleared, returned to a jail cell, then found unconscious that afternoon, and succumbed to his injuries, according to the Contra Costa County sheriff’s office.—
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Metcalf remained unconscious when firefighters left the hospital.—
Adjective
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The brain, like other internal organs, is insensate, its lack of sensory receptors attested by videos of virtuoso violinists who play on unfazed as neurosurgeons go to work inside their skulls.—
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But states have used midazolam alone — and at much higher doses — in executions since 2013, claiming the drug will render people insensate to pain before the administration of other lethal injection drugs.—
Adjective
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The greatest accusation levied against her is the crime of being an unfeeling mother.—
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Then, the men had to walk around as these unfeeling, aggressive, hyper-masculine creatures.—
Adjective
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This is partly because the loss of insentient machinery, no matter how expensive, is easier to stomach than the death of an aircrew.—
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But its shortcomings are essentially those of the novel: its single-track didacticism; its neat pitting of romantic idealists against macho, insentient normies; and the fact that a decisive plot twist can be spotted a mile off.—
Adjective
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Some people carried her lifeless body to a vehicle, which took it to a hospital.—
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How did life emerge on a lifeless planet?—
Cite this Entry
“Inanimate.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/inanimate. Accessed 12 Jan. 2026.
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