Word.ws English Dictionary

well-known

/ˌwɛlˈnəʊn//ˌwɛlˈnoʊn/

well-known adjective: familiar, famous, renowned, noted or widely known.

Adjective

well-known (comparative better-known or more well-known, superlative best-known or most well-known)

  1. Familiar, famous, renowned, noted or widely known.
    • Edward Churchill still attended to his work in a hopeless mechanical manner like a sleep-walker who walks safely on a well-known round. But his Roman collar galled him, his cossack stifled him, his biretta was as uncomfortable as a merry-andrew's cap and bells.1918, W[illiam] B[abington] Maxwell, chapter XV, in The Mirror and the Lamp, Indianapolis, Ind.: The Bobbs-Merrill Company, →OCLC
    • There are a number of diseases that are considered to be universally fatal. AIDS and rabies encephalitis are well-known examples.1997, Norris McWhirter (editor), The Guinness Book of World Records 1997, page 29
    Synonyms:
    noted, twice-told
    Antonyms:
    little-known
  2. (not comparable) Generally recognized; reserved for some usual purpose.
    • We would like to catalog other sockets which are supposed to be well-known1972, Vint Cerf, Jon Postel, RFC 322 - Well known socket numbers
    • If the call to this function fails, you can assume the SID was invalid — even if it's a well-known SID.2003, John Mueller, .NET development security solutions

well-known meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Malayalam and Kannada

well-known in Hindi

familiar, widely known
प्रसिद्ध prasiddh, प्रख्यात prakhyāt, विख्यात vikhyāt, बहुचर्चित bahucarcit, लोकप्रिय lokapriya

well-known in Tamil

நன்கு அறியப்பட்ட, புகழ்பெற்ற

well-known in Malayalam

familiar, widely known
അറിയപ്പെടുന്ന aṟiyappeṭunna, പ്രശസ്ത praśasta, പേരുകേട്ട pērukēṭṭa

well-known in Kannada

ವಿಖ್ಯಾತ, ಪ್ರಸಿದ್ಧ, ಹೆಸರುವಾಸಿಯಾದ, ಮಂದಿ ತಿಳಿದ, ಹೆಸರಾದ
More languagesFewer languages
well-known in Punjabi
ਪਰਸਿੱਧ parsiddha
well-known in Sanskrit
प्रसिद्ध prasiddha

Examples of well-known in a sentence

  • At 6 weeks and 9 months, the babies’ motor skills were tested using the Peabody Developmental Motor Scales, a well-known assessment tool that looks at gross, fine and total motor abilities.2017 June 9, Susan Scutti, “Study links mosquito spray to delayed motor skills in babies”, in CNN, archived from the original on 06 Oct...
  • Less well-known is NR's High Marnham test track, which occupies part of the former Lancashire, Derbyshire and East Coast Railway (LDECR) Chesterfield-Lincoln line in Nottinghamshire.2024 November 27, Ben Jones, “Testing trains, tracks and systems”, in RAIL, number 1023, page 33:
  • A common approach is for the server to accept messages at a well-known port.2007, Larry L Peterson, Bruce S Davie, Computer networks: a systems approach:

Synonyms of well-known

Antonyms

Forms of well-known

comparativebetter-known
comparativemore well-known
superlativebest-known
superlativemost well-known
alternative formwell known
alternative formwellknown

Origin of well-known

From Middle English well knowen. By surface analysis, well + known.

Questions about well-known

What does well-known mean?
Well-known means familiar, famous, renowned, noted or widely known.
What is well-known in Hindi?
Well-known in Hindi is प्रसिद्ध (prasiddh), प्रख्यात (prakhyāt), विख्यात (vikhyāt). See Well-known meaning in Hindi.
How do you use well-known in a sentence?
At 6 weeks and 9 months, the babies’ motor skills were tested using the Peabody Developmental Motor Scales, a well-known assessment tool that looks at gross, fine and total motor abilities.
What part of speech is well-known?
Well-known is an adjective.
How do you pronounce well-known?
Well-known is pronounced /ˌwɛlˈnoʊn/ (US).

Words near well-known in the dictionary

  1. well-intentioned
  2. well-kempt
  3. well-kemptness
  4. well-kept
  5. well-knit
  6. well-known
  7. well-laid
  8. well-learned
  9. well-liked
  10. well-liking
  11. well-lit

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: well-known (page history and authors); well-known (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); well-known (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); ਪਰਸਿੱਧ (Punjabi) (page history and authors); प्रसिद्ध (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.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Persent101-well-known.wav, LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-well-known.wav.

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