insist
Syllables: in·sist/ɪnˈsɪst/
insist verb: to hold up a claim emphatically.
Verb
insist (third-person singular simple present insists, present participle insisting, simple past and past participle insisted)
- To hold up a claim emphatically.
- The defendant insisted on his innocence.
- I insist that my secretary dresses nicely.
- To demand continually that something happen or be done; to reiterate a demand despite requests to abandon it.
- The Prime Minister insisted on his Chancellor's resignation.
- The Prime Minister insisted that his Chancellor resign.
- To stand (on); to rest (upon); to lean (upon).
- Angles likewise which insist on the Diameter, are all Right Angles.1709, Venturus Mandey, Synopsis Mathematica Universalis
insist meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Urdu and Bengali
insist in Hindi
- to insist
- आग्रह करना āgrah karnā
- to insist, be obstinate
- ज़िद करना zid karnā
- to insist, defy
- अकड़ना akaṛnā
- to insist, persist
- अड़ना aṛnā
insist in Tamil
- வற்புறுத்து, உறுதியாகக் கூறு, அடம்பிடி
insist in Urdu
- to insist
- آگرہ کرنا āgrah karnā
- insist, persist
- اصرار کرنا isrār karnā
- to insist, be stubborn
- اڑنا aṛnā
insist in Bengali
- জেদ করা, জোর দেওয়া, আবদার করা
More languagesFewer languages
- insist in Telugu
- పట్టుబట్టు paṭṭubaṭṭu
- insist in Malayalam
- ശഠിക്കുക, മർക്കടമുഷ്ടി പിടിക്കുക, ഊന്നിപ്പറയുക, നിർബ്ബന്ധം പിടിക്കുക
- insist in Kannada
- ಒತ್ತಿಹೇಳು, ನಿರ್ಣಾಯಕವಾಗಿಹೇಳು, ಘೋಷಿಸು, ಪಟ್ಟುಹಿಡಿ
- insist in Gujarati
- આગ્રહ રાખવો, આગ્રહ કરવો
- insist in Arabic
- أَصَرَّ ʔaṣarra, أَلَحَّ ʔalaḥḥa
- insist in Indonesian
- bersikeras
- insist in Persian
- اصرار کردن esrâr kardan, پافشاری کردن pâfevâri kardan
Examples of insist in a sentence
- I insist that my secretary dress nicely.
- I know I promised to pay you back tomorrow, but it's not very convenient for me. Can we put it off to Friday? —I'm afraid I have to insist on what we agreed.
- We began to tell her about Mohair and the cotillon, and of our point of observation from the Florentine galleried porch, and she insisted she would join us there.1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter V, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company...
- Piling debt onto companies’ balance-sheets is only a small part of what leveraged buy-outs are about, they insist.2013 June 22, “Engineers of a different kind”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8841, page 70:
- "There is a case for a buffer zone, but the problem is that land is at such a premium it is difficult to insist on a large distance between houses and railway lines," she said.2026 March 18, Greg Morse, “1996 crash driving freight reforms”, in RAIL, number 1057, page 51:
Forms of insist
| third-person singular present | insists |
|---|---|
| present participle | insisting |
| past participle | insisted |
| past | insisted |
Origin of insist
Partly from Middle French insister, from Latin īnsistere; and partly from a back-formation from insistence. Compare typologically from the same PIE root Bulgarian настоявам (nastojavam), Russian наста́ивать (nastáivatʹ).
Words formed from insist
Words that rhyme with insist
43 more rhymesFewer rhymes
- frist
- Liszt
- piste
- tryst
- agist
- consist
- dismissed
- encyst
- hist
- pissed
- sist
- tier list
- trist
- whist
- wrist
- absist
- atwist
- bist
- cist
- coexist
- contrist
- cyst
- delist
- demist
- desist
- dissed
- dream list
- exist
- fair list
- get one's knickers in a twist
- glissed
- hissed
- is't
- ist
- kissed
- missed
- rankist
- schist
- triste
- unlist
- ventriloquist
- wist
- xyst
Questions about insist
- What does insist mean?
- Insist means to hold up a claim emphatically.
- What is insist in Hindi?
- Insist in Hindi is आग्रह करना (āgrah karnā), ज़िद करना (zid karnā), अकड़ना (akaṛnā). See Insist meaning in Hindi.
- How do you use insist in a sentence?
- I insist that my secretary dress nicely.
- What part of speech is insist?
- Insist is a verb.
- How do you pronounce insist?
- Insist is pronounced /ɪnˈsɪst/.
- What is the past tense of insist?
- The past tense of insist is insisted.
Words near insist in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: insist (page history and authors); अकड़ना (Hindi) (page history and authors); insist (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); آگرہ کرنا (Urdu) (page history and authors); Insist (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); insist (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); insist (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); insist (Gujarati, 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-us-insist1.ogg.
Cite this entry: “insist.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/insist. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.