Word.ws English Dictionary

-ive

/ɪv/

-ive suffix: an adjective suffix signifying relating or belonging to, of the nature of, tending to, or serving to; as: affirmative, active, conclusive, corrective, diminutive.

Suffix

-ive

  1. An adjective suffix signifying relating or belonging to, of the nature of, tending to, or serving to; as: affirmative, active, conclusive, corrective, diminutive.

Origin of -ive

From Middle English -yf, from Anglo-Norman -if from Latin -īvus. Until the fourteenth century, all Middle English loanwords from Anglo-Norman ended in -if (compare actif, natif, sensitif, pensif etc.). Under the influence of literary Neo-Latin, both languages introduced the form -ive. Those forms that have not been replaced were subsequently changed to end in -y (compare hasty, from hastif, jolly, from jolif etc.). Like the Latin suffix -iō (genitive -iōnis), the Latin suffix -ivus is appended to the perfect passive participle to form an adjective of action.

Questions about -ive

What does -ive mean?
-ive means an adjective suffix signifying relating or belonging to, of the nature of, tending to, or serving to; as: affirmative, active, conclusive, corrective, diminutive.
What part of speech is -ive?
-ive is a suffix.
How do you pronounce -ive?
-ive is pronounced /ɪv/.

Words near -ive in the dictionary

  1. -itol
  2. -itude
  3. -ity
  4. -ium
  5. -iums
  6. -ive
  7. -iz-
  8. -ization
  9. -izations
  10. -ize
  11. -ized

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: -ive (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl--ive.wav.

Cite this entry: “-ive.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/-ive. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.