Word.ws English Dictionary

preadaptive

preadaptive adjective: serving as an adaptation for something to occur in the future.

Adjective

preadaptive (not comparable)

  1. Serving as an adaptation for something to occur in the future.
    • The pelvic modifications were associated with changes which were not primarily concerned with locomotion, but which rendered the pelvis preadaptive for erect posture.1987, John G. Fleagle, Primate Evolution and Human Origins, page 264

Origin of preadaptive

From pre- + adaptive.

Questions about preadaptive

What does preadaptive mean?
Preadaptive means serving as an adaptation for something to occur in the future.
What part of speech is preadaptive?
Preadaptive is an adjective.

Words near preadaptive in the dictionary

  1. preadaptation
  2. preadaptations
  3. preadaptative
  4. preadapted
  5. preadapting
  6. preadaptive
  7. preadapts
  8. preadded
  9. preadditive category
  10. preaddress
  11. preaddressed

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: preadaptive (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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Cite this entry: “preadaptive.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/preadaptive. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.