intelligent
/ɪnˈtɛlɪd͡ʒənt/
intelligent adjective: of high or especially quick cognitive capacity, bright.
Adjective
intelligent (comparative more intelligent or (rare, proscribed) intelligenter, superlative most intelligent or (rare, proscribed) intelligentest)
- Of high or especially quick cognitive capacity, bright.
- Anstruther laughed good-naturedly. “[…] I shall take out half a dozen intelligent maistries from our Press and get them to give our villagers instruction when they begin work and when they are in the fields.”1927, F. E. Penny, chapter 5, in Pulling the Strings
- Well thought-out, well considered.
- The engineer had a very intelligent design proposal for the new car.
- The general devised an intelligent strategy for the southern campaign.
- Characterized by thoughtful interaction.
- My girlfriend and I had an intelligent conversation.
- Having at least a similar level of brain power to humankind.
- The hunt for extraterrestrial intelligent life continues.
- Synonyms:
- self-aware
- Having an environment-sensing automatically-invoked built-in computer capability.
- an intelligent network or keyboard
Noun
intelligent (plural intelligents)
- A member of the intelligentsia; an intelligent person.
- Now, as all intelligents are doomed to pass probationary states, it is highly probable that many intelligents, long antecedent to the foundation of our world, may have tarnished their innocence; or worse, many may have by disobedience fallen.1832, The Comparative Coincidence of Reason and Scripture, volume II, London: J[ohn] Hatchard and Son, […], page 253
- Like many Russian intelligents, the Merežkovskijs, together with Filosofov and the young student Vladimir Zlobin, fled from Russia in 1919.1972, Olga Matich, Paradox in the Religious Poetry of Zinaida Gippius, Wilhelm Fink, →ISBN, page 30
intelligent meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu
intelligent in Hindi
- of high or especially quick cognitive capacity, bright
- बुद्धिमान buddhimān, चतुर catur, सयाना sayānā
intelligent in Tamil
- புத்திசாலியான, நுண்ணறிவுள்ள
intelligent in Marathi
- बुद्धीमान, बुद्धिमान
intelligent in Urdu
- of high or especially quick cognitive capacity, bright
- ہوشیار hośiyār, سمجھدار samajhdār
More languagesFewer languages
- intelligent in Bengali
- বুদ্ধিমান buddhiman
- intelligent in Malayalam
- ബുദ്ധിയുള്ള buddhiyuḷḷa
- intelligent in Kannada
- ಚಾಲಾಕು cālāku
- intelligent in Punjabi
- ਅਕਲਮੰਦ akalmand
- intelligent in Gujarati
- બુદ્ધિશાળી
- intelligent in Odia
- ତୀକ୍ଷ୍ଣ tikṣṇa
- intelligent in Sanskrit
- प्रज्ञ prajña, चतुर catura, मनु manu
- intelligent in Assamese
- বুধিয়ক budhik
- intelligent in Nepali
- तिखो tikho
- intelligent in Pashto
- هوښيار húx̌yâr, ځيرک źírak
- intelligent in Tagalog
- intelihente, matalino, pinag-isipan
- intelligent in Arabic
- ذَكِيّ ḏakiyy
- intelligent in Malay
- cerdas, pintar
- intelligent in Persian
- باهوش bâ-huš, هوشمند huš-mand
- intelligent in Thai
- ฉลาด chà-làat
- intelligent in Vietnamese
- thông minh
Examples of intelligent in a sentence
- The old man had craggy, uncultured features, but had bright, intelligent eyes.
- I hear she has a new boyfriend. What's he like? –He's intelligent and handsome.
- The book was written for professionals, but an intelligent layperson could understand most of it.
Synonyms of intelligent
17 more synonymsFewer synonyms
Antonyms
Forms of intelligent
| Adjective | |
|---|---|
| comparative | more intelligent |
| superlative | most intelligent |
| alternative form | entelligent |
| comparative proscribed (rare) | intelligenter |
| superlative proscribed (rare) | intelligentest |
| Noun | |
| plural | intelligents |
Origin of intelligent
From Middle French intelligent, from Latin intellegēns (“discerning”), present active participle of intellegō (“understand, comprehend”), itself from inter (“between”) + legō (“choose, pick out, read”).
Partly from Russian интеллиге́нт (intelligént) and partly from the adjective.
Words formed from intelligent
- artificially intelligent
- general intelligent action
- hyperintelligent
- intelligent agent
- intelligent character recognition
- intelligent dance music
- intelligent design
- intelligent designer
- intelligent designism
- intelligent disobedience
- intelligent falling
- intelligent guess
- intelligent haunting
- intelligentization
- intelligentness
- intelligent system
- intelligent terminal
- intelligent transportation system
- nonintelligent
- superintelligent
- ultraintelligent
Phrases with intelligent
Questions about intelligent
- What does intelligent mean?
- Intelligent means of high or especially quick cognitive capacity, bright.
- What is intelligent in Hindi?
- Intelligent in Hindi is बुद्धिमान (buddhimān), चतुर (catur), सयाना (sayānā). See Intelligent meaning in Hindi.
- What part of speech is intelligent?
- Intelligent can be an adjective or a noun.
- How do you pronounce intelligent?
- Intelligent is pronounced /ɪnˈtɛlɪd͡ʒənt/.
Words near intelligent in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: intelligent (page history and authors); intelligent (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); intelligent (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); ಚಾಲಾಕು (Kannada) (page history and authors); intelligent (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); ତୀକ୍ଷ୍ଣ (Odia) (page history and authors); तिखो (Nepali) (page history and authors); هوښيار (Pashto) (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-intelligent.ogg.
Cite this entry: “intelligent.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/intelligent. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.