Word.ws English Dictionary

resist

Syllables: re·sistUK/ɹɪˈzɪst/

More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations

Australia/ɹɪˈzɪst/

resist verb: to attempt to counter the actions or effects of.

Verb

resist (third-person singular simple present resists, present participle resisting, simple past and past participle resisted)

  1. (transitive) To attempt to counter the actions or effects of.
    • Shepard: You could have resisted. You could have fought! Instead, you surrendered. You quit.2008, BioWare, Mass Effect (Science Fiction), Redwood City: Electronic Arts, →ISBN, →OCLC, PC, scene: Citadel
    • Seeing the British establishment struggle with the financial sector is like watching an alcoholic who still resists the idea that something drastic needs to happen for him to turn his life around.2013 June 28, Joris Luyendijk, “Our banks are out of control”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 189, number 3, page 21
  2. (transitive) To withstand the actions of.
    • At length, one night, when the company by ſome accident broke up much ſooner than ordinary, ſo that the candles were not half burnt out, ſhe was not able to reſiſt the temptation, but reſolved to have them ſome way or other. Accordingly, as ſoon as the hurry was over, and the ſervants, as ſhe...1762, Charles Johnstone, The Reverie; or, A Flight to the Paradise of Fools, volume 2, Dublin: Printed by Dillon Chamberlaine, →OCLC, page 202
    • The preposterous altruism too![…]Resist not evil. It is an insane immolation of self—as bad intrinsically as fakirs stabbing themselves or anchorites warping their spines in caves scarcely large enough for a fair-sized dog.1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XVI, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC
  3. (intransitive) To oppose; to refuse to accept.
    Synonyms:
    hold out
  4. (obsolete, transitive) To be distasteful to.
    • These cates resist me,c. 1607–1608 (date written), William Shakespeare, [George Wilkins?], The Late, and Much Admired Play, Called Pericles, Prince of Tyre. […], London: […] [William White and Thomas Creede] for Henry...

Noun

resist (countable and uncountable, plural resists)

  1. A protective coating or covering.
    • Keeping the ties loose ensures that the yarn can absorb the dye without creating a resist.2026, Katherine Augustine, “Dyeing in the Baking Aisle”, in Spin Off, volume L, number 1, page 35

resist meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Bengali and Telugu

resist in Tamil

எதிர் செய்

resist in Urdu

مخالفت کرنا, مزاحمت کرنا

resist in Bengali

প্রতিহত করা, সহ্য করা, বাধা দেওয়া, প্রতিবন্ধক হওয়া

resist in Telugu

ప్రతిఘటించడానికి, ప్రతిఘటించుటకు
More languagesFewer languages
resist in Malayalam
എതിർക്കുക, പ്രതിഷേധിക്കുക
resist in Kannada
ವಿರೋಧಿಸು, ಎದುರಿಸು, ಪ್ರತಿಭಟಿಸು, ತಡೆಗಟ್ಟು
resist in Gujarati
પ્રતિકાર કરવો, પ્રતિકાર કરવા
resist in Odia
ପ୍ରତିହତ କରିବା
resist in Sanskrit
क्षम् kṣam, बाधति bā́dhati, बाधते bā́dhate, पिपर्ति píparti
resist in Arabic
قَاوَمَ qāwama
resist in Persian
تاوستن tāvestan
resist in Thai
ต่อต้าน dtɔ̀ɔ-dtâan, ต้านทาน dtâan-taan, ต้าน dtâan, คัดค้าน kát-káan
resist in Vietnamese
chống cự

Examples of resist in a sentence

  • It took everything in me to resist the temptation to skip work on my birthday.
  • When I saw the new book, I couldn't resist the impulse to browse through it.
  • She was resolute in her determination to resist his romantic advances.

All 40 example sentences with resist

Synonyms of resist

Antonyms

All synonyms and antonyms of resist

Forms of resist

Verb
third-person singular presentresists
present participleresisting
past participleresisted
pastresisted
second-person singular present (archaic)resistest
second-person singular past (archaic)resistedst
third-person singular present (archaic)resisteth
Noun
pluralresists

Past tense of resist: resisted

Origin of resist

From Middle English resisten, from Middle French resister and Old French resistre, and their source, Latin resistere, from re- + sistere (“cause to stand”).

Words formed from resist

Words that rhyme with resist

43 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about resist

What does resist mean?
Resist means to attempt to counter the actions or effects of.
What is resist in Tamil?
Resist in Tamil is எதிர் செய். See Resist meaning in Tamil.
What part of speech is resist?
Resist can be a verb or a noun.
How do you pronounce resist?
Resist is pronounced /ɹɪˈzɪst/ (UK).
What is the past tense of resist?
The past tense of resist is resisted.

Words near resist in the dictionary

  1. resipiscent
  2. resipped
  3. resipping
  4. resips
  5. resiquimod
  6. resist
  7. resist work
  8. resistability
  9. resistable
  10. resistance
  11. resistance arm

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: resist (page history and authors); resist (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); resist (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); resist (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); resist (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); resist (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); resist (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); resist (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); resist (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); क्षम् (Sanskrit) (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: “resist.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/resist. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.