Word.ws English Dictionary

ultimate

Syllables: ul·tim·ate/ˈʌltɪmət/

ultimate adjective: final; last in a series. Also the ellipsis of ultimate frisbee or ultimate disc.

Adjective

ultimate (comparative more ultimate, superlative most ultimate)

  1. (not comparable) Final; last in a series.
    • […] they [the sounds of an echo] next strike the ultimate secondary object, then the penultimate and antepenultimate; […]1677, Robert Plot, “Of the Heavens and Air”, in The natural history of Oxford-shire: Being an Essay Toward the Natural History of England, page 15
    Antonyms:
    initial, original
  2. (not comparable) Last in a word or other utterance.
  3. Being the greatest possible; maximum; most extreme.
    • the ultimate pleasure
    • the ultimate disappointment
    Antonyms:
    original, derivative
  4. Being the most distant or extreme; farthest.
    Synonyms:
    outermost, outmost
  5. (not comparable) That will happen at some time; eventual.
    Synonyms:
    inevitable
  6. (not comparable) Last in a train of progression or consequences; tended toward by all that precedes; arrived at, as the last result; final.
    • those ultimate truths and those universal laws of thought which we cannot rationally contradict1825, S[amuel] T[aylor] Coleridge, Aids to Reflection in the Formation of a Manly Character on the Several Grounds of Prudence, Morality, and Religion: […], London: […] Thomas Davison, […] for Taylor...
  7. (not comparable) Incapable of further analysis; incapable of further division or separation; constituent; elemental.
    • an ultimate constituent of matter

Noun

ultimate (countable and uncountable, plural ultimates)

  1. The most basic or fundamental of a set of things
  2. The final or most distant point; the conclusion
  3. The greatest extremity; the maximum

Verb

ultimate (third-person singular simple present ultimates, present participle ultimating, simple past and past participle ultimated)

  1. (archaic, transitive) To finish; to complete.
    • These measures have been carried forward with a zeal and unanimity that warrant the hope we entertain, of ultimating the plans in respect to our Temple, before the next meeting of the Maryland Association.1869, The New-Jerusalem Magazine, volume 41, page 36

Also used as

ultimate is also the ellipsis of ultimate frisbee or ultimate disc.

ultimate meaning in Hindi, Urdu, Telugu and Malayalam

ultimate in Hindi

final; last in a series
अंतिम antim, अंत्य antya

ultimate in Urdu

الٹیمیٹ

ultimate in Telugu

అల్టిమేట్ చేయడం

ultimate in Malayalam

ആത്യന്തികമായ, ആത്യന്തികമായത്
More languagesFewer languages
ultimate in Indonesian
terakhir, ultima, pamungkas, terpungkas

Examples of ultimate in a sentence

  • Injudicious charity has probably been productive of far more ultimate evil, than the coldest and most indiscriminating selfishness.1813, Henry Ware, Noah Worcester, The Christian Disciple and Theological Review, Boston, Cummings and Hilliard, pages 227-228:
  • Hepaticology, outside the temperate parts of the Northern Hemisphere, still lies deep in the shadow cast by that ultimate "closet taxonomist," Franz Stephani—a ghost whose shadow falls over us all.1992, Rudolf M[athias] Schuster, The Hepaticae and Anthocerotae of North America: East of the Hundredth Meridian, volume V, Chicago, Ill....

All 40 example sentences with ultimate

Synonyms of ultimate

17 more synonymsFewer synonyms

Antonyms

All synonyms and antonyms of ultimate

Forms of ultimate

Adjective
comparativemore ultimate
superlativemost ultimate
Noun
pluralultimates
Verb
third-person singular presentultimates
present participleultimating
past participleultimated
pastultimated

Origin of ultimate

* From Medieval Latin ultimātus (“furthest, last”), perfect passive participle of ultimō (“to come to an end”) (see -ate (1,2 and 3)), from ultimus (“last, final”) + -ō (verb-forming suffix). See ultra-. * (ultimate frisbee): The sport was renamed to avoid the use of the Frisbee trademark.

Words formed from ultimate

Phrases with ultimate

Words that rhyme with ultimate

Questions about ultimate

What does ultimate mean?
Ultimate means final; last in a series.
What is ultimate in Hindi?
Ultimate in Hindi is अंतिम (antim), अंत्य (antya). See Ultimate meaning in Hindi.
How do you use ultimate in a sentence?
Injudicious charity has probably been productive of far more ultimate evil, than the coldest and most indiscriminating selfishness.
What part of speech is ultimate?
Ultimate can be an adjective, a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce ultimate?
Ultimate is pronounced /ˈʌltɪmət/ (UK).

Words near ultimate in the dictionary

  1. ultimacies
  2. ultimacy
  3. Ultimae Thules
  4. ultimas
  5. ultimata
  6. ultimate
  7. Ultimate Boeing 747 gambit
  8. ultimate disc
  9. ultimate frisbee
  10. ultimate sacrifice
  11. ultimate sacrifices

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: ultimate (page history and authors); ultimate (Urdu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); ultimate (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); ultimate (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: LL-Q1860 (eng)-I learned some phrases-ultimate.wav, En-us-ultimate.ogg.

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