Skip to content
HOW TO PRONOUNCE

dominant

/ˈdɑmənənt/

Press play to hear how to pronounce dominant.

American Pronunciation Guide · 1:03
Watch on YouTube ↗

What does dominant mean?

noun

  1. The fifth major tone of a musical scale (five major steps above the note in question); thus G is the dominant of C, A of D, and so on.
  2. The triad built on the dominant tone.
  3. Of an allele, that a heterozygote for the allele has the same phenotype as the homozygote.
More meanings (7)

noun

  1. A species or organism that is dominant.
  2. The dominating partner in sadomasochistic sexual activity.

adjective

  1. Ruling; governing; prevailing
  2. Predominant, common, prevalent, of greatest importance.
  3. Of a body part, preferred and used with greater dexterity than the other, as the right hand of a right-handed person or the left hand of a left-handed one.
  4. Designating the follicle which will survive atresia and permit ovulation.
  5. Being the dominant

Definitions regrouped for readability · CC BY-SA 4.0

IPA pronunciation

/ˈdɑmənənt/

Wiktionary contributors · CC BY-SA 4.0

Pronunciation varies by speaker and region. About these dictionary pronunciations.

In the pages of books

See this word in context.

But each has some especial virtue in dominant degree, and the nature story is, on this ground, identified with the thought given.
Sara Cone BryantHow to Tell Stories to Children, and Some Stories to TellProject Gutenberg ebook #474
Those features of the facts at hand are salient and substantial upon which the dominant interest of the time throws its light.
Thorstein VeblenThe Theory of the Leisure ClassProject Gutenberg ebook #833
More book examples (3)
The dominant species of the larger dominant groups tend to leave many modified descendants, and thus new sub-groups and groups are formed.
Charles DarwinOn the Origin of Species By Means of Natural Selection Or, the Preservation of Favoured Races in the Struggle for LifeProject Gutenberg ebook #1228
At the same period the two rites appear to have been practised simultaneously in Armorica, but there incineration was the dominant custom.
Jean-François-Albert du Pouget, marquis de NadaillacManners and Monuments of Prehistoric PeoplesTranslated by N. D'AnversProject Gutenberg ebook #3309
These women, whose essential distinction of motherhood was the dominant note of their whole culture, were strikingly deficient in what we call “femininity.”
Charlotte Perkins GilmanHerlandProject Gutenberg ebook #32