Word.ws English Dictionary

grace

/ɡɹeɪs//ɡɹeɪs/

grace noun: charming, pleasing qualities.

Noun

grace (countable and uncountable, plural graces)

  1. Charming, pleasing qualities.
    • The Princess brought grace to an otherwise dull and boring party.
    • Study gives strength to the mind; conversation, grace: the first apt to give stiffness, the other suppleness: one gives substance and form to the statue, the other polishes it.1699, William Temple, Heads designed for an essay on conversations
  2. (countable) A short prayer of thanks before or after a meal.
    • It has become less common to say grace before having dinner.
  3. (countable) In the games of patience or solitaire: a special move that is normally against the rules.
  4. (countable) A grace note.
    • The Trill being the most usual Grace, is usually made in Closes, Cadences, and when on a long Note Exclamation or Passion is expressed, there the Trill is made in the latter part of such Note; but most usually upon binding Notes and such Notes as precede the closing Note.1683, John Playford, An Introduction to the Skill of Musick: In Three Books, page 47
  5. (uncountable) Elegant movement; elegance of movement; balance or poise.
    • The dancer moved with grace and strength.
    Synonyms:
    gracefulness
  6. (uncountable) An allowance of time granted to a debtor during which they are free of at least part of their normal obligations towards the creditor.
    • The repayment of the loan starts after a three-year grace.
    • With mounting anger the King denounced the pair, both father and son, and was about to condemn them to death when his strength gave out. Faint and trembling he was unable to walk and the sword fell from his hands as he murmured: 'May the Protector of the Buddhist Faith grant me but seven more days...1990, Claude de Bèze, translated by E. W. Hutchinson, 1688 revolution in Siam: the memoir of Father de Bèze, s.j, University Press, page 153
  7. Favor, sanction or beneficence.
    • The minister has extended his grace to our effort.
    1. (uncountable) Free and undeserved favour from God; unmerited divine assistance given to humans for their regeneration or sanctification, or for resisting sin.
      • Near-synonyms: Divine Providence, Providence
      • divine grace
  8. An act or decree of the governing body of an English university.
  9. (archaic) Mercy, pardon.

Verb

grace (third-person singular simple present graces, present participle gracing, simple past and past participle graced)

  1. (transitive) To adorn; to decorate; to embellish and dignify.
    • He graced the room with his presence.
    • He graced the room by simply being there.
  2. (transitive) To dignify or raise by an act of favour; to honour.
    • He might, at his pleasure, grace […]or disgrace whom he would in court.1603, Richard Knolles, The Generall Historie of the Turkes, […], London: […] Adam Islip, →OCLC
  3. (transitive) To supply with heavenly grace.
    • Thy first publique miracle graceth a marriage1612–1634, [Joseph Hall], “(please specify the page)”, in [Contemplations vpon the Principall Passages of the Holy Storie], volume (please specify |volume=I to VIII), London, →OCLC
  4. (transitive) To add grace notes, cadenzas, etc., to.
    • For D and E, the G and A fingers are generally used for gracing, though E is sometimes more conveniently graced by F#.1987, L. E. McCullough, The Complete Irish Tin Whistle Tutor (New & Revised), page 22

Proper noun (1) capitalized: Grace

Grace (countable and uncountable, plural Graces)

  1. (countable) A female given name from English.
    • To The Handsome Mistress Grace Potter: As is your name, so is your comely face / Touch'd everywhere with such a diffused grace /1648, Robert Herrick, Hesperides
    • Grace does not belie her name; for she is indeed a sweet girl, modest and unassuming, and appearing to be unconscious of having done anything great or noble. - OBSERVER, Dec.16, 1838.1839, George William MacArthur Reynolds, Grace Darling, or the Heroine of the Fern Islands, page 24
  2. (countable) A surname.
  3. A minor city in Caribou County, Idaho.
  4. An unincorporated community in Kentucky.
  5. A census-designated place and unincorporated community in Issaquena County, Mississippi.
  6. An unincorporated community in Carroll County, Missouri.
  7. An unincorporated community in Laclede County, Missouri.
  8. An unincorporated community in Silver Bow County, Montana.
  9. An unincorporated community in Hampshire County, West Virginia.
  10. An unincorporated community in Roane County, West Virginia.

Proper noun (2) capitalized: GRACE

GRACE

  1. (abbreviation, acronym) Acronym of Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment.
    • Since the Tibetan plateau contains a lot of “closed” catchments, from which meltwater cannot easily escape, large amounts of melting could happen without GRACE detecting them.2013 May 11, “The climate of Tibet: Pole-land”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8835, archived from the original on 06 Aug 2020, page 80

grace meaning in Hindi, Urdu, Telugu and Malayalam

grace in Hindi

elegant movement, poise or balance
अदा adā
free and undeserved favour, especially of God
कृपा kŕpā, फ़ैज़ faiz
divine assistance in resisting sin
आशीर्वाद āśīrvād, आशीष āśīṣ

grace in Urdu

elegant movement, poise or balance
ادا adā
free and undeserved favour, especially of God
کَرَم karam, عِنایَت 'ināyat

grace in Telugu

కృప

grace in Malayalam

കൃപ
More languagesFewer languages
grace in Kannada
ಅನುಗ್ರಹ
grace in Odia
ଅନୁଗ୍ରହ
grace in Malay
doa, lemah lembut, tempoh, limpah kurnia
grace in Indonesian
rahmat, kasih karunia
grace in Persian
ناز nâz, منت mennat, سپاسه sepâse
grace in Thai
ความเมตตากรุณา gà-rú-naa, พระคุณ prá-kun

Examples of grace in a sentence

  • His portrait graced a landing on the stairway.
  • Addison's style and manner as natural and unaffected, easy and polite, and full of those graces which a flowery imagination diffuses over writing.1783, Hugh Blair, “Critical Examniation of the Style of Mr. Addison in No. 411 of The Spectator”, in Lectures on Rhetoric and Belles...
  • But by the grace of God I am what I am: and his grace which was bestowed vpō me, was not in vaine: But I laboured more abundantly then they all, yet not I, but the grace of God which was with me:1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, 1 Corinthians 15:10:
  • Moreover, from her earliest days the bairn had some glimmerings of grace.1902, John Buchan, The Outgoing of the Tide:
  • Great Jove and Phoebus graced his noble line.c. 1699 – 1703, Alexander Pope, “The First Book of Statius His Thebais”, in The Works of Mr. Alexander Pope, volume I, London: […]...

All 40 example sentences with grace

Synonyms of grace

Forms of grace

Noun
pluralgraces
Verb
third-person singular presentgraces
present participlegracing
past participlegraced
pastgraced
Proper noun
pluralGraces

Past tense of grace: graced

Plural of grace: graces

Origin of grace

From Middle English grace, from Old French grace (modern French grâce), from Latin grātia (“kindness, favour, esteem”), from grātus (“pleasing”), from Proto-Indo-European *gʷerH- (“to praise, welcome”); compare grateful. The word displaced the native Middle English held, hield (“grace”) (from Old English held, hyld (“grace”)), Middle English este (“grace, favour, pleasure”) (from Old English ēst (“grace, kindness, favour”)), Middle English athmede(n) (“grace”) (from Old English ēadmēdu (“grace”)), Middle English are, ore (“grace, mercy, honour”) (from Old English ār (“honour, grace, kindness, mercy”)).

From the noun grace, first used by Puritans in the 16th century. In Roman Catholic use it may refer to Our Lady of Graces, cognate with Italian Grazia.

Words formed from grace

Phrases with grace

5 more phrasesFewer phrases

Words that rhyme with grace

45 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about grace

What does grace mean?
Grace means charming, pleasing qualities.
What is grace in Hindi?
Grace in Hindi is अदा (adā), कृपा (kŕpā), फ़ैज़ (faiz). See Grace meaning in Hindi.
How do you use grace in a sentence?
His portrait graced a landing on the stairway.
What part of speech is grace?
Grace can be a noun, a verb or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce grace?
Grace is pronounced /ɡɹeɪs/ (UK).
What is the plural of grace?
The plural of grace is graces.

Words near grace in the dictionary

  1. Grabówek
  2. grac't
  3. Graca
  4. Gracas
  5. Gracchus
  6. grace
  7. grace and favor
  8. grace and favour
  9. Grace Estate
  10. grace note
  11. grace notes

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: grace (page history and authors); Grace (page history and authors); GRACE (page history and authors); grace (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); grace (Malayalam, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); grace (Kannada, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); grace (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model 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.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-uk-grace.oga, en-us-grace.ogg.

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