Word.ws English Dictionary

class

/klɑːs/

More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations

Northern England/klæs/

class noun: a group, collection, category or set sharing characteristics or attributes.

class: a group, collection, category or set sharing characteristics or attributes
Image: Diego Grez, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

class (countable and uncountable, plural classes)

  1. (countable) A group, collection, category or set sharing characteristics or attributes.
    • The new Ford Fiesta is set to be best in the 'small family' class.
    • That is one class-A heifer you got there, sonny.
  2. (countable) A social grouping, based on job, wealth, etc. In Britain, society is commonly split into three main classes: upper class, middle class and working class.
    • Seeing the British establishment struggle with the financial sector is like watching an alcoholic […]. Until 2008 there was denial over what finance had become. […] But the scandals kept coming, and so we entered stage three – what therapists call "bargaining". A broad section of the political...2013 June 28, Joris Luyendijk, “Our banks are out of control”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 3, page 21
  3. (uncountable) The division of society into classes.
    • Jane Austen's works deal with class in 18th-century England.
  4. (uncountable) Admirable behavior; elegance.
    • Apologizing for losing your temper, even though you were badly provoked, showed real class.
    Antonyms:
    vulgarity
  5. A group of students in a regularly scheduled meeting with a teacher.
    • The class was noisy, but the teacher was able to get their attention with a story.
  6. A series of lessons covering a single subject.
    • I took the cooking class for enjoyment, but I also learned a lot.
  7. A single lesson in a series.
    • Tomorrow's class will cover long division.
  8. (countable) A group of students who commenced or completed their education during a particular year. A school class.
    • The class of 1982 was particularly noteworthy.
    • Thirty years ago there were only a few high schools for boys, and in 1957 the first university class consisted of only 50 young men.1987 October, Marianne Alireza, “Women of Saudi Arabia”, in National Geographic, volume 172, number 4, page 443
  9. (India) a grade, standard, level of education.
  10. (countable) A category of seats in an airplane, train or other means of mass transportation.
    • I used to fly business class, but now my company can only afford economy.
    • The City & South London was also the first British passenger railway to offer only one class.2012, Andrew Martin, Underground Overground: A passenger's history of the Tube, Profile Books, →ISBN, page 101
  11. (countable) A rank in the classification of organisms, below phylum and above order; a taxon of that rank.
    • Magnolias belong to the class Magnoliopsida.
  12. Best of its kind.
    • It is the class of Italian bottled waters.
    • The mark made by Cory a new Central A. U. mark and he appears to be the class of the field in this event.1913 June 27, “The Crime Is Not in Making a Mistake, but in Repeating It.”, in Chicago Tribune
Show 5 more meaningsShow fewer meanings
  1. A grouping of data values in an interval, often used for computation of a frequency distribution.
  2. A collection of sets definable by a shared property, especially one which is not itself a set (in which case the class is called proper).
    • The class of all sets is not a set.
    • Every set is a class, but classes are not generally sets. A class that is not a set is called a proper class.
  3. A group of people subject to be conscripted in the same military draft, or more narrowly those persons actually conscripted in a particular draft.
  4. (countable, object-oriented programming) A set of objects having the same behavior (but typically differing in state), or a template defining such a set in terms of its common properties, functions, etc.
    • an abstract base class
  5. One of the sections into which a Methodist church or congregation is divided, supervised by a class leader.

Verb

class (third-person singular simple present classes, present participle classing, simple past and past participle classed)

  1. (transitive) To assign to a class; to classify.
    • I would class this with most of the other mediocre works of the period.
    • She was a fat, round little woman, richly apparelled in velvet and lace, […]; and the way she laughed, cackling like a hen, the way she talked to the waiters and the maid,[…]—all these unexpected phenomena impelled one to hysterical mirth, and made one class her with such immortally ludicrous types...1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter II, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC
  2. (intransitive) To be grouped or classed.
    • the genus or family under which it classes1790, Edward Tatham, The Chart and Scale of Truth
  3. (transitive) To divide into classes, as students; to form into, or place in, a class or classes.

Adjective

class (not comparable)

  1. (Geordie, Ireland, slang) great; fabulous
    • To talented authors Tim Ash and Brian Reich for introducing me to John Wiley & Sons—a truly class outfit.2009, Erik Qualman, Socialnomics

Proper noun capitalized: CLASS

CLASS

  1. (abbreviation) Abbreviation of Cosmology Large Angular Scale Surveyor.
  2. (abbreviation) Abbreviation of Cosmology Large Angular Scale Survey.

class meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu

class in Hindi

social grouping, based on job, wealth, etc.
वर्ग varg
group of students in a regularly scheduled meeting with a teacher
क्लास klās, कक्षा kakṣā
series of classes covering a single subject
क्लास klās

class in Tamil

group of students in a regularly scheduled meeting with a teacher
வகுப்பு vakuppu

class in Marathi

group, collection, category or set sharing characteristics or attributes
वर्ग varga
social grouping, based on job, wealth, etc.
वर्ग varga
group of students in a regularly scheduled meeting with a teacher
वर्ग varga

class in Urdu

group of students in a regularly scheduled meeting with a teacher
جَماعَت jamā'at, کِلاس kilās
group of students who commenced or completed their education during a particular year
جَماعَت jamā'at
More languagesFewer languages
class in Telugu
తరగతి taragati
class in Nepali
कक्षा kakṣā
class in Pashto
صنف sinf, کلاس klās
class in Tagalog
lipihay
class in Arabic
صِنْف ṣinf, صَنْف ṣanf, طَبَقَة ṭabaqa, فَصْل faṣl
class in Malay
kelas, darjat
class in Indonesian
kelas
class in Thai
ประเภท bprà-pêet, พรรค์ pan, ชนิด chá-nít, ชั้น chán
class in Vietnamese
giai cấp, tầng lớp, lớp, khoá
class in Myanmar
မျိုး myui:, အတန်း a.tan:, မျိုးပေါင်း myui:paung:

Examples of class in a sentence

  • Often used to imply membership of a large class.
  • This word has a whole class of metaphoric extensions.
  • So I ask you to accept my statement that my critics fall into two classes: on the one hand my immediate accusers, and on the other those earlier ones whom I have mentioned; […]1954, Plato, translated by Hugh Tredennick, “Socrates on Trial: The Apology”, in The Last Days of Socrates (Penguin Classics)...
  • The Magpies are unbeaten and enjoying their best run since 1994, although few would have thought the class of 2011 would come close to emulating their ancestors.2011 October 1, Saj Chowdhury, “Wolverhampton 1-2 Newcastle”, in BBC Sport:
  • A broad section of the political class now recognises the need for change but remains unable to see the necessity of a fundamental overhaul.2013 June 28, Joris Luyendijk, “Our banks are out of control”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 3, page 21:
  • University of Southern California's 7 to 0 defeat of the mighty Cardinal team ranked the victors the class of the far west1929 October 27, “89,000 Watch So. California Defeat Stanford, 7 to 0”, in Chicago Tribune:

All 40 example sentences with class

Synonyms of class

6 more synonymsFewer synonyms

Antonyms

All synonyms and antonyms of class

Forms of class

Noun
pluralclasses
Verb
third-person singular presentclasses
present participleclassing
past participleclassed
pastclassed

Past tense of class: classed

Plural of class: classes

Origin of class

From Middle French classe, from Latin classis (“a class or division of the people, assembly of people, the whole body of citizens called to arms, the army, the fleet, later a class or division in general”), from Proto-Indo-European *kelh₁- (“to call, shout”). Doublet of clas and classis. Displaced Old English ġecynd.

Words formed from class

Phrases with class

133 more phrasesFewer phrases

Words that rhyme with class

1 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about class

What does class mean?
Class means a group, collection, category or set sharing characteristics or attributes.
What is class in Hindi?
Class in Hindi is वर्ग (varg), क्लास (klās), कक्षा (kakṣā). See Class meaning in Hindi.
How do you use class in a sentence?
Often used to imply membership of a large class.
What part of speech is class?
Class can be a noun, a verb, an adjective or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce class?
Class is pronounced /klɑːs/ (UK).
What is the plural of class?
The plural of class is classes.

Words near class in the dictionary

  1. clasping
  2. claspings
  3. claspless
  4. clasps
  5. claspt
  6. class
  7. Class 1
  8. Class 2
  9. Class 3
  10. class A
  11. class act

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: class (page history and authors); CLASS (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: en-uk-class.ogg, en-us-class.ogg.

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