single out
Syllables: sin·gle out/ˌsɪŋ.ɡəl ˈaʊ̯t/
More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations
Australia/ˌsɪŋ.ɡəl ˈæɔ̯t/
single out verb: to select (someone or something) from a group and highlight them or treat them differently.
Verb
single out (third-person singular simple present singles out, present participle singling out, simple past and past participle singled out)
- To select (someone or something) from a group and highlight them or treat them differently.
- Eddie singled out his favorite marble from the bag.
- Yvonne always wondered why Ernest had singled her out of the group of giggling girls she hung around with.
Synonyms of single out
Forms of single out
| third-person singular present | singles out |
|---|---|
| present participle | singling out |
| past participle | singled out |
| past | singled out |
Origin of single out
From single (“to take alone, or one by one”, intransitive archaic verb) + out. First attested in 1629.
Questions about single out
- What does single out mean?
- Single out means to select (someone or something) from a group and highlight them or treat them differently.
- What part of speech is single out?
- Single out is a verb.
- How do you pronounce single out?
- Single out is pronounced /ˌsɪŋ.ɡəl ˈaʊ̯t/ (UK).
- What is the past tense of single out?
- The past tense of single out is singled out.
Words near single out in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: single out (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: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-single out.wav.
Cite this entry: “single out.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/single_out. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.