impetus
Syllables: im·pe·tus/ˈɪm.pə.təs/
More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations
nonstandard/ɪmˈpiː.təs/
impetus noun: anything that impels; a stimulating factor.
Noun
impetus (plural impetuses or impetus)
- Anything that impels; a stimulating factor.
- The outbreak of World War II in 1939 gave a new impetus to receiver development.
- Once set a strong mind thinking, and you have done all that it needs for its education. It matters little what is the first impetus, so that it only be set to work.1838 (date written), L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], chapter VI, in Lady Anne Granard; or, Keeping up Appearances. […], volume I, London: Henry Colburn, […], published 1842, →OCLC, page 64
- A force, either internal or external, that impels; an impulse.
- The force or energy associated with a moving body; a stimulus.
- A principle of motive force, held as equivalent to weight times velocity by John Buridan, in an auxiliary theory of Aristotelian dynamics introduced by John Philoponus, describing projectile motion against gravity as linear until it transitions to a vertical drop and the intellectual precursor to the concepts of inertia, momentum and acceleration in classical mechanics.
- An activity in response to a stimulus.
impetus meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Bengali and Malayalam
impetus in Tamil
- உந்து வேகம், திருப்புத்திறன், தூண்டு விசை, தூண்டுகை, தூண்டுதல், மனக்கிளர்ச்சி
impetus in Urdu
- جوش, دم, زور
impetus in Bengali
- something that impels
- উদ্দীপনা uddipona
- the force or energy associated with a moving body; a stimulus
- উদ্দীপনা uddipona
impetus in Malayalam
- ഗതി, പ്രചോദനം, ആയം, പ്രേരണ
More languagesFewer languages
- impetus in Kannada
- ಬಿಣಿತೆ, ಉರುಬೆ, ಹುರಿ, ಪ್ರಚೋದನೆ
- impetus in Sanskrit
- वेग véga
- impetus in Persian
- برانگیزنده barângizanda, barângizande, نیروی برانگیزنده nirôye barângizande, انگیختار angixtâr
Examples of impetus in a sentence
- However, the increasing Kazakhization that started soon after the declaration of independence has lost its impetus.
- And lists are very good when you are running out of motivation and impetus.
- You suffer from a humongous impetus to xertz your liquor, you drunkulous monolith!
Forms of impetus
| plural | impetuses |
|---|---|
| plural | impetus |
Origin of impetus
Borrowed from Latin impetus (“a rushing upon, an attack, assault, onset”), from impetō (“to rush upon, attack”), from in- (“upon”) + petō (“to seek, fall upon”).
Questions about impetus
- What does impetus mean?
- Impetus means anything that impels; a stimulating factor.
- What is impetus in Tamil?
- Impetus in Tamil is உந்து வேகம், திருப்புத்திறன், தூண்டு விசை. See Impetus meaning in Tamil.
- What part of speech is impetus?
- Impetus is a noun.
- How do you pronounce impetus?
- Impetus is pronounced /ˈɪm.pə.təs/.
- What is the plural of impetus?
- The plural of impetus is impetuses.
Words near impetus in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: impetus (page history and authors); impetus (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); impetus (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); impetus (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); impetus (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); वेग (Sanskrit) (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: En-us-impetus.ogg.
Cite this entry: “impetus.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/impetus. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.