Word.ws English Dictionary

above all

above all prepositional phrase: of prime importance; before anything else; especially.

Prepositional phrase

  1. Of prime importance; before anything else; especially.
    • Lastly, I must mention the "Underground," to travel on which was, in those days, an experience to be remembered. There were the antique looking engines, and the rather grim carriages, with the fascinating indicators in the compartments to show (not always correctly!) the next station, and above...1957 July, M. D. Greville, “A Diamond Jubilee of Railway Memories”, in Railway Magazine, page 459
    • [Editor David W. Blight said:] Deeply in need of father figures and spiritual hope, and “religiously seeking knowledge,” as he recalled it, the slave boy [the young Frederick Douglass] turned to a religious black man, a freeman named Charles Lawson, who worked as a drayman for a rope maker and...1997 [1797], David W. Blight, “Editor's Introduction: The Peculiar Dialogue Between Caleb Bingham and Frederick Douglass”, in Caleb Bingham, edited by David W. Blight, The Columbian Orator...

above all meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Malayalam and Thai

above all in Tamil

எல்லாவற்றுக்கும் மேலாக, முதன்மையாக

above all in Urdu

مقدم

above all in Malayalam

first of all, most importantly, before everything
സർവ്വോപരി, സർവ്വപ്രധാനമായി, ഏറ്റവും പ്രധാനമായി, എല്ലാറ്റിനും മുമ്പ്, എല്ലാറ്റിനുമപ്പുറം, ആദ്യമായി

above all in Thai

of prime importance
สิ่งสำคัญที่สุด sìng săm-kan têe sùt, เหนือสิ่งอื่นใด nĕua sìng èun dai

Examples of above all in a sentence

  • From old Lawson he gained […] above all […] a belief in a benevolent and protective God, the faith that his “life was under the guidance of a wisdom higher than my own.”1997 [1797], David W. Blight, “Editor's Introduction: The Peculiar Dialogue Between Caleb Bingham and Frederick Douglass”, in Caleb...
  • You could just use ordinary shop-bought kecap manis to marinade the meat, but making your own is easy, has a far more elegant fragrance and is, above all, such a great brag!2015 October 27, Matt Preston, The Simple Secrets to Cooking Everything Better, Plum, →ISBN, page 192:

Synonyms of above all

Antonyms

Origin of above all

From Middle English [Term?]. Compare Dutch bovenal (“above all”).

Questions about above all

What does above all mean?
Above all means of prime importance; before anything else; especially.
What is above all in Tamil?
Above all in Tamil is எல்லாவற்றுக்கும் மேலாக, முதன்மையாக. See Above all meaning in Tamil.
How do you use above all in a sentence?
From old Lawson he gained […] above all […] a belief in a benevolent and protective God, the faith that his “life was under the guidance of a wisdom higher than my own.”
What part of speech is above all?
Above all is a prepositional phrase.

Words near above all in the dictionary

  1. aboutsledge
  2. aboutsledges
  3. aboutta
  4. above
  5. above a bit
  6. above all
  7. above and beyond
  8. above average
  9. above board
  10. Above Derwent
  11. above grass

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: above all (page history and authors); above all (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); above all (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); above all (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license). 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.

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

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