Word.ws English Dictionary

outmate

outmate verb: to mate with an individual who is not part of one's immediate social group.

Verb

outmate (third-person singular simple present outmates, present participle outmating, simple past and past participle outmated)

  1. To mate with an individual who is not part of one's immediate social group.
  2. (transitive) To surpass in finding mates; to outbreed.
  3. (obsolete, transitive) To outmatch.

Noun

outmate (plural outmates)

  1. (rare) A former inmate.
    • It is enough to make a monkey laugh and angels weep to see sixteen to twenty millions of folks quarreling, fussing, cheering, hooting and acting generally like outmates of a lunatic asylum every time these two gangs of political bunko-steerers run you up against their old game—which a child ought...1919, Philip Francis, What’s the Matter With Our America, [New York, N.Y.]: The Littlebooks Library, →OCLC, page 19
    • They also assign an inmate to an “outmate” who will correspond with him prior to release, then, hopefully, after release serve as a friend standing by. Exactly what each outmate does for his inmate will vary with individual situations.1972, Christian Herald, volume 95, page 51, column 3

Examples of outmate in a sentence

  • One way to help an outmate is to let her return to help the inmates.1972, Nancy Thomas, “Helpmates: A Volunteer Recreation Program in a City Jail”, in Therapeutic Recreation Journal, volume 6, National...
  • The padre was entering through the outer office door as he was passing through. / ‘Ah, an inmate becomes an outmate,’ giggled the clergyman. ‘God be with you.’1986, Leslie Thomas, The Adventures of Goodnight & Loving, Los Angeles, Calif.: Price Stern Sloan, →ISBN, page 286:
  • The assistant D.A., the police investigators, the jailers and judges, all cringed when they had to process the papers that would make an inmate an outmate.1993, Charles Sevilla, Wilkes on Trial, New York, N.Y.: Ballantine Books, →ISBN, page 67:
  • With the inmates now outmates on PRISON BREAK (FOX, 8/7c), Mahone homes in on the escapees, now that he’s deciphered the D.B.2006, TV Guide, volume 54, page 55:

Forms of outmate

Verb
third-person singular presentoutmates
present participleoutmating
past participleoutmated
pastoutmated
Noun
pluraloutmates

Origin of outmate

From out- + mate.

From out- + -mate, by analogy with inmate.

Questions about outmate

What does outmate mean?
Outmate means to mate with an individual who is not part of one's immediate social group.
How do you use outmate in a sentence?
One way to help an outmate is to let her return to help the inmates.
What part of speech is outmate?
Outmate can be a verb or a noun.
What is the past tense of outmate?
The past tense of outmate is outmated.

Words near outmate in the dictionary

  1. outmasters
  2. outmatch
  3. outmatched
  4. outmatches
  5. outmatching
  6. outmate
  7. outmated
  8. outmates
  9. outmating
  10. outmeasure
  11. outmeasured

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: outmate (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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