agitate
/ˈæ.d͡ʒɪ.teɪt/
agitate verb: to disturb or excite; to perturb or stir up (a person).
Verb
agitate (third-person singular simple present agitates, present participle agitating, simple past and past participle agitated)
- To disturb or excite; to perturb or stir up (a person).
- He was greatly agitated by the news.
- Synonyms:
- disturb, unsettle, freak, sting, bother, bring down, discompose, unstring, disconcert, enturbulate
- To cause to move with a violent, irregular action; to shake.
- to agitate water in a vessel
- The wind agitates the sea.
- To participate in political agitation (sense 3).
- NAMBLA is working to build a coalition of gay, lesbian, progressive and civil liberties groups to agitate against the increasing state attacks on gay men who associate with boys.1981 August 1, Mitzel, “NAMBLA Says National Crackdown Starting”, in Gay Community News, page 3
- To set in motion; to actuate.
- To discuss or debate.
- Your speech at the time a bill for the regency was agitated now lies before me.1790, Mary Wollstonecraft, A Vindication of the Rights of Men
- To mull over, or think deeply about; to consider, to devise.
- Politicians agitate desperate designs.
- Synonyms:
- revolve, ruminate, afterthink, bethink, call to mind, chew, chew over, chew the cud, cogitate, consider
agitate meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Urdu and Bengali
agitate in Hindi
- to agitate, disturb
- चकराना cakrānā
agitate in Tamil
- கிளர்ச்சி செய், கலகம் விளை, கலக்கு, குலுக்கு, ஆட்டு, அசை
agitate in Urdu
- agitate
- اشتعال بازی کرنا iśte'āl bāzī karnā
agitate in Bengali
- আন্দোলন করা
More languagesFewer languages
- agitate in Malayalam
- ബഹളം കൂട്ടുക, പൊതു ജനശ്രദ്ധ ഉണർത്തുക, പ്രക്ഷോഭം നടത്തുക, ക്ഷോഭിപ്പിക്കുക
- agitate in Kannada
- ತುಳುಕು, ಕಲಕು, ಅಸುಂಬು, ಅಳಾಂಚು
- agitate in Sanskrit
- इङ्गति iṅgati
- agitate in Sinhala
- අල්ලනවා allanawā
- agitate in Persian
- آشفتن, پریشان کردن
Examples of agitate in a sentence
- The Northern youths did not agitate for the sack of previous Defence Ministers.
- These upheavals occurred almost homoplasiously with European states agitating to be autexousious.
- Viewing animals inside an enclosure bounded by barriers agitates many people simply because the perspective seems wrong.
Synonyms of agitate
30 more synonymsFewer synonyms
Antonyms
Forms of agitate
| third-person singular present | agitates |
|---|---|
| present participle | agitating |
| past participle | agitated |
| past | agitated |
Origin of agitate
From Middle English agitat(e) (“set in motion”), borrowed from Latin agitātus, perfect passive participle of agitō (“to put in motion”) (see -ate (verb-forming suffix)), frequentative of agō (“to drive, move, push”), see -tō. Cognate with French agiter. See also act and agent.
Words formed from agitate
Questions about agitate
- What does agitate mean?
- Agitate means to disturb or excite; to perturb or stir up (a person).
- What is agitate in Hindi?
- Agitate in Hindi is चकराना (cakrānā). See Agitate meaning in Hindi.
- What part of speech is agitate?
- Agitate is a verb.
- How do you pronounce agitate?
- Agitate is pronounced /ˈæ.d͡ʒɪ.teɪt/ (UK).
- What is the past tense of agitate?
- The past tense of agitate is agitated.
Words near agitate in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: agitate (page history and authors); चकराना (Hindi) (page history and authors); agitate (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); اشتعال بازی کرنا (Urdu) (page history and authors); agitate (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); agitate (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); agitate (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); අල්ලනවා (Sinhala) (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.
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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Mélange a trois-agitate.wav.
Cite this entry: “agitate.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/agitate. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.