Word.ws English Dictionary

compared

Syllables: com·paredUK/kəmˈpɛəd//kəmˈpɛɹd/

compared is the simple past and past participle of compare.

Meaning of compare

Verb

compare (third-person singular simple present compares, present participle comparing, simple past and past participle compared)

  1. (transitive) To assess the similarities and differences between two or more things [“to compare X with Y”]. Having made the comparison of X with Y, one might have found it similar to Y or different from Y.
    • Compare the tiger's coloration with that of the zebra.
  2. (transitive) To declare two things to be similar in some respect [“to compare X to Y”].
    • Astronomers have compared comets to dirty snowballs.
    Synonyms:
    liken
  3. (transitive) To form the three degrees of comparison of (an adjective).
    • We compare “good” as “good”, “better”, “best”.
  4. (intransitive) To be similar (often used in the negative).
    • A sapling and a fully-grown oak tree do not compare.
  5. (obsolete) To get; to obtain.
    • To fill his bags, and richesse to compare.1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto IV”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza 28

See all 8 meanings of compare

Words formed from compared

Phrases with compared

Words that rhyme with compared

13 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about compared

What is compared the simple past and past participle of?
Compared is the simple past and past participle of compare.
How do you pronounce compared?
Compared is pronounced /kəmˈpɛɹd/ (US).

Words near compared in the dictionary

  1. compare and despair
  2. compare apples to apples
  3. compare apples with apples
  4. compare notes
  5. compareable
  6. compared
  7. compared and contrasted
  8. compared and despaired
  9. compared apples to apples
  10. compared apples with apples
  11. compared notes

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: compared (page history and authors); compare (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-us-compared.ogg.

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