minute
/ˈmɪnɪt/[maɪ̯ˈnjuːt]
minute noun: a unit of time which is one sixtieth of an hour (sixty seconds).
Noun
minute (plural minutes)
- A unit of time which is one sixtieth of an hour (sixty seconds).
- Holonyms: hectosecond < kilosecond < hour < day < week < megasecond < fortnight < month < year < gigasecond < century < kiloannum, kiloyear, millennium < terasecond < mega-annum, megayear < petasecond < giga-annum, gigayear < exasecond < zettasecond < yottasecond < ronnasecond < quettasecond
- Meronyms: quectosecond < rontosecond < yoctosecond < zeptosecond < attosecond < femtosecond < picosecond < nanosecond < microsecond < millisecond < centisecond < decisecond < second < decasecond
- A short but unspecified time period.
- give me a minute
- Wait a minute, I’m not ready yet!
- Synonyms:
- instant, jiffy, mo, moment, sec, second, tic, bat of an eye, bit, blink of an eye
- A unit of angle equal to one-sixtieth of a degree.
- We need to be sure these maps are accurate to within one minute of arc.
- Synonyms:
- minute of arc, sexagesm, arcminute
- A (usually formal) written record of a meeting or a part of a meeting.
- Let’s look at the minutes of last week’s meeting.
- The Clerk or 'recording Clerk' drafts a minute and then, or at a later time, reads it to the Meeting. Subsequent contributions are on the wording of the minute only, until it can be accepted by the Meeting. Once the minute is accepted, the Meeting moves on to the next item on the agenda.2008, Pink Dandelion, The Quakers: A Very Short Introduction, page 52
- A unit of purchase on a telephone or other similar network, especially a cell phone network, roughly equivalent in gross form to sixty seconds' use of the network.
- If you buy this model, you’ll get 100 free minutes.
- A point in time; a moment.
- I conked out the minute I got home.
- Tell her, that I some Certainty may bring; / I go this minute to attend the king.1675, John Dryden, Aureng-zebe
- A nautical or a geographic mile.
- An old coin, a half farthing.
- A very small part of anything, or anything very small; a jot; a whit.
- […]according to the Prophecies of him, which were so clear and descended to minutes and circumstances of his passion1660, Jeremy Taylor, “Of the Probable or Thinking Conscience.”, in Ductor Dubitantium, or, The Rule of Conscience in all her Generall Measures Serving as a Great Instrument for the Determination of...
- A fixed part of a module.
- A while or a long unspecified period of time.
- Oh, I ain't heard that song in a minute!
- “Man, I haven’t seen you in a minute,” he says, smiling still. “Maybe like two, three years ago?”2010, Kenneth Ring, Letters from Palestine, page 18
- Synonyms:
- age, spell, aeon, ages, blue moon, coon's age, crow's age, dog's age, donkey's years, eld
- The distance that can be traveled in a minute.
Verb
minute (third-person singular simple present minutes, present participle minuting, simple past and past participle minuted)
- Of an event, to write in a memo or the minutes of a meeting.
- I’ll minute this evening’s meeting.
- I dare say there was a vast amount of minuting, memoranduming, and despatch-boxing, on this mighty subject.1870 [1855 June 27], Charles Dickens, “Administrative Reform”, in Speeches Literary and Social, page 133
- To set down a short sketch or note of; to jot down; to make a minute or a brief summary of.
- The Empress of Russia, with her own hand, minuted an edict for universal tolerance.1876 [1834], George Bancroft, History of the United States from the discovery of the American continent, volume VI, pages 28–29
Adjective
minute (comparative minuter or more minute, superlative minutest or most minute)
- Very small.
- They found only minute quantities of chemical residue on his clothing.
- Synonyms:
- infinitesimal, insignificant, minuscule, tiny, trace
- Antonyms:
- big, enormous, colossal, huge, significant, tremendous, vast
- Very careful and exact, giving small details.
- The lawyer gave the witness a minute examination.
- The single-imaging optic of the mammalian eye offers some distinct visual advantages. Such lenses can take in photons from a wide range of angles, increasing light sensitivity. They also have high spatial resolution, resolving incoming images in minute detail.2013 July-August, Fenella Saunders, “Tiny Lenses See the Big Picture”, in American Scientist
- Synonyms:
- exact, exacting, excruciating, precise, scrupulous, accurate, careful, surgical, comprehensive, solicitous
minute meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu
minute in Hindi
- unit of time
- मिनट minaṭ, दक़ीक़ा daqīqa
minute in Tamil
- unit of time
- நிமிடம் nimiṭam, நிமிஷம் nimiṣam, மணித்துளி maṇittuḷi, நுணுத்தம் nuṇuttam
minute in Marathi
- unit of time
- मिनिट miniṭ
minute in Urdu
- unit of time
- دَقِیقَہ daqīqa, مِنَٹ minaṭ
More languagesFewer languages
- minute in Bengali
- মিনিট miniṭ, মুহূর্ত muhurto
- minute in Telugu
- నిమిషము nimiṣamu
- minute in Malayalam
- മിനിറ്റ് miniṟṟŭ
- minute in Kannada
- ನಿಮಿಷ nimiṣa, ನಸು nasu, ಸ್ವಲ್ಪ svalpa
- minute in Punjabi
- ਮਿੰਟ miṇṭ
- minute in Gujarati
- મિનિટ miniṭ
- minute in Odia
- ମିନଟ minaṭa
- minute in Sanskrit
- चूर्ण cūrṇa, स्वल्प svalpa
- minute in Sinhala
- විනාඩිය wināḍiya, මිනිත්තුව minittuwa
- minute in Nepali
- मिनेट mineṭ
- minute in Pashto
- دقيقه daqiqa, منټ minëṭ
- minute in Tagalog
- minuto, sandali, katitikan
- minute in Arabic
- دَقِيقَة daqīqa, دِقيقة digīgə, دَقِيقة dagīga, دقيقة dqīqa
- minute in Malay
- minit, catatan, sekejap
- minute in Indonesian
- menit, minit, minuta
- minute in Persian
- دَقِیقَه daqīqa, دَقیقِه daġiġe, دَقِه daġe, صورَتجَلَسِه surat-jalase
- minute in Thai
- นาที naa-tii, ลิปดา líp-daa, แป๊บเดียว bpɛ́ɛp-diao
- minute in Vietnamese
- phút, biên bản, lát, chốc
- minute in Myanmar
- မိနစ် mi.nac
Examples of minute in a sentence
- You have twenty minutes to complete the test.
- Total activity levels in the lowest quartile were equivalent to walking for 49 minutes at roughly 3 miles (4.8 kilometers) per hour daily.2024 November 15, Kristen Rogers, “Want to live an extra 5 to 10 years? Adopt this habit, study suggests”, in CNN, archived from the...
- I was a minute younger than you. […]I remember thinking, saying to myself..."This is the first time I'm eating as a person who killed someone."2016 November 8, Ben Katai, Josh Corbin, Sharon Lennon, directed by Ben Katai, StartUp(Recapitalization) (StartUp (TV series)), season 1...
- On 17 November 1949 Jay minuted Cripps, arguing that trade liberalization on inessentials was socially regressive.1995, Edmund Dell, The Schuman Plan and the British Abdication of Leadership in Europe:
Synonyms of minute
30 more synonymsFewer synonyms
Antonyms
Forms of minute
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | minutes |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | minutes |
| present participle | minuting |
| past participle | minuted |
| past | minuted |
| Adjective | |
| comparative | minuter |
| comparative | more minute |
| superlative | minutest |
| superlative | most minute |
Origin of minute
From Middle English mynute, minute, mynet, from Old French minute, from Medieval Latin minūta (“60th of an hour; note”). Doublet of menu and menudo.
Borrowed from Latin minūtus (“small", "petty”), perfect passive participle of minuō (“make smaller”).
Words formed from minute
- 15-minute city
- 15 minutes
- 15 minutes of fame
- 15 minutes of shame
- any minute now
- arcminute
- a sucker is born every minute
- at the last minute
- at the minute
- by the minute
- California minute
- fifteen minutes
- fifteen minutes of fame
- five-minute hypothesis
- football minute
- for a minute
- forty minutes of hell
- four-minute warning
- hot minute
- in a minute
- just a minute
- last minute
- last-minute
- laugh a minute
- light minute
- mad minute
- man-minute
- Microsoft minute
- mile-a-minute
- mile a minute
- minutage
- minutary
- minute bell
- minute book
- minuteful
- minute glass
- minute gun
- minute hand
- minute-jack
- minute man
- minute-man
- minute minder
- minute pirate bug
- minute pudding
- minute repeater
- minuteslong
- minute steak
- minutesworth
- minute-to-minute
- multiminute
- New York minute
- not a minute too soon
- one minute man
- one-minute man
- one-minute stand
- one-minute warning
- red-hot minute
- seven minutes in heaven
- talk a mile a minute
- there's a sucker born every minute
Phrases with minute
- arc minute
- minute men
- a la minute
- minute guns
- this minute
- à la minute
- minute bells
- minute hands
- minute of arc
- minute steaks
- to the minute
- wait a minute
16 more phrasesFewer phrases
Words that rhyme with minute
Questions about minute
- What does minute mean?
- Minute means a unit of time which is one sixtieth of an hour (sixty seconds).
- What is minute in Hindi?
- Minute in Hindi is मिनट (minaṭ), दक़ीक़ा (daqīqa). See Minute meaning in Hindi.
- How do you use minute in a sentence?
- You have twenty minutes to complete the test.
- What part of speech is minute?
- Minute can be a noun, a verb or an adjective.
- How do you pronounce minute?
- Minute is pronounced /ˈmɪnɪt/.
- What is the plural of minute?
- The plural of minute is minutes.
Words near minute in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: minute (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-uk-a minute.ogg, en-us-minute-noun.ogg.
Cite this entry: “minute.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/minute. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.