substitute
Syllables: sub·sti·tute/ˈsʌb.stɪ.tʃuːt/
More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations
Australia/ˈsɐbstɪtjʉːt/
substitute verb: to use in place of something else, with the same function. Also the abbreviation of substitute good.
Verb
substitute (third-person singular simple present substitutes, present participle substituting, simple past and past participle substituted)
- To use in place of something else, with the same function.
- I had no shallots so I substituted onion.
- To use X in place of Y.
- I had to substitute new parts for the old ones.
- To use Y in place of X; to replace X with Y.
- I had to substitute old parts with the new ones.
- You know when you first have a baby, and you're like "I'm gonna die 'cause I've never slept"? … and you get [an] hour and a half in the middle of the night that you get to sleep. Your partner's like, "I'll take care of this." … I used that hour and a half, instead of sleeping, to watch The Pitt. …...2026 January 21, Ally Beardlsey, my boss is sabotaging my clown career (w/ Ally Beardsley), Perfect Person (podcast) episode 185 (c. 14:18)
- Synonyms:
- exchange
- To remove (a player) from the field of play and bring on another in his place.
- He was playing poorly and was substituted after twenty minutes
- Mario Balotelli replaced Tevez but his contribution was so negligible that he suffered the indignity of being substituted himself as time ran out, a development that encapsulated a wretched 90 minutes for City and boss Roberto Mancini.2011 April 11, Phil McNulty, “Liverpool 3 - 0 Man City”, in BBC Sport
- To serve as a replacement (for someone or something).
- Accumulation of wealth by this route may substitute for personal saving.1987, James Tobin, Essays in Economics, Vol. 2, page 75
Noun
substitute (plural substitutes)
- A replacement or stand-in for something that achieves a similar result or purpose.
- Ladies [in William Shakespeare's age], again, universally wore masks as the sole substitute known to our ancestors for the modern parasol; a fact, perhaps, not generally known.1840 February, Thomas De Quincey, “Theory of Greek Tragedy”, in Leaders in Literature with a Notice of Traditional Errors Affecting Them (De Quincey’s Works; IX), London: James Hogg & Sons, →OCLC...
- Since you left me, if you see me with another girl / Seeming like I'm having fun / Although she may be cute, she's just a substitute / Because you're the permanent one1965, “The Tracks of My Tears”, in Going to a Go-Go, performed by Smokey Robinson and The Miracles
- Synonyms:
- substituend, surrogate
- Antonyms:
- substituend, substituendum
- A substitute teacher.
- A player who is available to replace another if the need arises, and who may or may not actually do so.
- Dean Whitehead opened the scoring shortly after the break with a low finish and substitute Peter Crouch sealed the win with a tap-in.2011 November 3, David Ornstein, “Macc Tel-Aviv 1 - 2 Stoke”, in BBC Sport
- Synonyms:
- reserve
- One who enlists for military service in the place of a conscript.
Also used as
substitute is also the abbreviation of substitute good.
substitute meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Telugu and Malayalam
substitute in Hindi
- replacement or stand-in
- प्रत्याम्नाय pratyāmnāy
substitute in Tamil
- மாற்று
substitute in Telugu
- replacement or stand-in
- ప్రత్యామ్నాయం pratyāmnāyaṁ
substitute in Malayalam
- പകരക്കാരൻ
More languagesFewer languages
- substitute in Tagalog
- halili
- substitute in Arabic
- اِسْتَبْدَلَ istabdala
- substitute in Indonesian
- pengganti
- substitute in Thai
- แทน tɛɛn
Examples of substitute in a sentence
- Oh, I substituted sleep for watching The Pitt."2026 January 21, Ally Beardlsey, my boss is sabotaging my clown career (w/ Ally Beardsley), Perfect Person (podcast) episode 185 (c. 14:18)
- No other love before / Could do what you do / A little so much (Oh) / So much more from you / No one else will do / There's no substitute / Your love's the finest love I've ever known / Ooh-ooh-ooh1986, The S.O.S. Band, “The Finest”, in Sands of Time:
- When you absolutely, positively got to kill every motherfucker in the room, accept no substitutes.1997, Quentin Tarantino, Jackie Brown, spoken by Ordell Robbie (Samuel L. Jackson):
Synonyms of substitute
Antonyms
Forms of substitute
| Verb | |
|---|---|
| third-person singular present | substitutes |
| present participle | substituting |
| past participle | substituted |
| past | substituted |
| Noun | |
| plural | substitutes |
Origin of substitute
From Middle English substituten, from Latin substitutus, past participle of substituō, from sub- (“under; beneath”) + statuō (“to put up; establish”). Displaced native Old English spala (“a substitute”) and spelian (“to substitute”).
Words formed from substitute
- bisubstituted
- bustitute
- chlorosubstituted
- cryosubstituted
- disubstituted
- heterosubstituted
- homosubstituted
- intersubstitute
- monosubstituted
- multisubstituted
- nonsubstituted
- pentasubstituted
- persubstituted
- polysubstituted
- resubstitute
- substitutability
- substitutable
- substitutee
- substituter
- substitutingly
- substitutive
- substitutor
- tetrasubstituted
- trisubstituted
- unsubstituted
- milk substitute
- salt substitute
- service as a software substitute
- sheriff-substitute
- substitute teacher
- sugar substitute
- turpentine substitute
Phrases with substitute
Words that rhyme with substitute
48 more rhymesFewer rhymes
- cute
- moot
- overshoot
- recruit
- salute
- volute
- dispute
- impute
- pollute
- scoot
- snoot
- chute
- depute
- dilute
- hoot
- loot
- pursuit
- reboot
- scute
- uproot
- Beirut
- cahoot
- Clute
- convolute
- lute
- zoot
- ablute
- Aleut
- argute
- astute
- beaut
- bruit
- compute
- coot
- doot
- en route
- glout
- jute
- minute
- newt
- poot
- refute
- repute
- resolute
- 'tute
- angel lute
- butte
- cheroot
Questions about substitute
- What does substitute mean?
- Substitute means to use in place of something else, with the same function.
- What is substitute in Hindi?
- Substitute in Hindi is प्रत्याम्नाय (pratyāmnāy). See Substitute meaning in Hindi.
- How do you use substitute in a sentence?
- Oh, I substituted sleep for watching The Pitt."
- What part of speech is substitute?
- Substitute can be a verb or a noun.
- How do you pronounce substitute?
- Substitute is pronounced /ˈsʌb.stɪ.tʃuːt/.
- What is the past tense of substitute?
- The past tense of substitute is substituted.
Words near substitute in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: substitute (page history and authors); substitute (Tamil, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); substitute (Malayalam, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). 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-us-substitute.ogg.
Cite this entry: “substitute.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/substitute. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.