Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- adv. To the greatest extent; completely: quite alone; not quite finished. See Usage Note at perfect.
- adv. Actually; really: I'm quite positive about it.
- adv. To a degree; rather: quite soon; quite tasty.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- An obsolete form of quit.
- Completely; wholly; entirely; totally; fully; perfectly.
- To a considerable extent or degree; noticeably: as, quite warm; quite pretty; quite clever; quite an artist: in this sense now chiefly colloquial and American.
- An obsolete form of quit.
- An obsolete dialectal form of white.
Wiktionary
- adv. To the greatest extent or degree; completely, entirely.
- adv. In a fully justified sense; truly, perfectly, actually.
- interj. chiefly UK Indicates agreement; "exactly so".
- n. bullfighting A series of passes made with the cape to distract the bull.
GNU Webster's 1913
- v. obsolete See quit.
- adv. Completely; wholly; entirely; totally; perfectly.
- adv. To a great extent or degree; very; very much; considerably.
WordNet 3.0
- adv. actually or truly or to an extreme
- adv. of an unusually noticeable or exceptional or remarkable kind (not used with a negative)
- adv. to the greatest extent; completely.
- adv. to a degree (not used with a negative)
Etymologies
- From Spanish quite. (Wiktionary)
- Middle English, from quite, clear, free, from Old French, from Latin quiētus, freed; see quiet. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“But you look quite well -- _quite_ well," she insisted.”
“Once or twice she said that though "Frank was adamant" when she had wished to get closer in touch with his interests and sympathies when he was quite a young man, yet she was always _quite_ in sympathy with her eldest son.”
“He was so clever, so distinguished, he had his eyes and his voice and his whole self so perfectly under control, that she never could be quite, _quite_ sure -- but now!”
“When he leaves us my heart will quite, _quite_ break -- and I sometimes hope”
“But you hoped, not quite so soon -- not _quite_ so soon.”
The Continental Monthly, Vol 2, No 6, December 1862 Devoted to Literature and National Policy
“My dear (mimicked Trix), you can be quite polite to so and so, but I cannot have you becoming friendly with them, you know they are not _quite_.”
“In this sense, the saying would be quite correct, as it is _quite wrong_ when applied to aesthetic facts.”
“Bashbang_ will certainly quite _quite_ eclipse those two other sensations, _What a Buttons Overheard in the Imperial Pickelhaube”
“Heads, necks and arms don't monopolise the pretty-pretties now, and, what with jewelled tunics, girdles, shoes, stockings and "_Honi soits_," as well as gems on what little corsage and skirt one may be wearing, one's jewel-box may be quite _quite_ emptied every evening.”
“Yvonne do my hair quite, _quite_ plainly, and I'm giving my jewels to my country.”
Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 147, September 2nd, 1914
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘quite’.
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Q words
Ever get stuck with the random bunch of letters and a q and not know any words? Well, maybe this will help.
quire, quais, quai, queer, quoit, quitrent, quipster, question, quest, questing, quests, quit and 208 more...
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Fake Minerals & Gemstones
dogbite, oliverstone, priceisrite, flapis faloozi, uptite, spondulikite, flashlite, crumpetwithvegemite, samsonite, goodnite, tennisquartz, fallfromagreathite and 101 more...
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Quaint Turns of Phrase
cut of his jib, do the square thi..., laws-a-massy, saints preserve us, napoo finny, pregnant pause, top o' the mornin', no spring chicken, worth each other'..., in high dudgeon, take umbrage, gives me the pip and 236 more...
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scrabble j q x z 4 and 5 letter words
revising for a competition 30 games
in 24 hours
5-Letter words with J, X, Q or Z
J
X
ADDAX ADMIX AFFIX ANNEX ATAXY AUXIN AXELS AXIAL AXILE AXILS A...azan, azon, boxy, brux, buzz, calx, chez, coax, coxa, cozy, crux, czar and 152 more...
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The Over-Worked "Very"
Synonyms for the word "very"
absolutely, actually, acutely, amazingly, assuredly, astonishingly, certainly, decidedly, desperately, downright, emphatically, exceedingly and 43 more...
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big book gre
abase, abbess, abbey, abbot, abdicate, abdomen, abdominal, abduction, abed, aberration, abet, abeyance and 6691 more...
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Autantonyms
Words that are the opposites of themselves; each of the words in the list below has at least two definitions of which one is the complete contrary of the other.
fast, buckle, weather, out, weedy, overlook, cleave, let, clip, quite, sanction, bolt and 19 more...
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Words for my English Learners
vast, superfluous, inevitable, though, pervasive, overwhelm, assume, presume, curious, eccentric, whimsical, quaint and 12 more...
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words
my words. my mind. my gosh.
try not to enjoy it too much.git, ghoti, sauce, quail, querulous, quarrelsome, reliability, untoward, incongruities, fission, fanatic, apple and 206 more...
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♥
ambrosia, inamorata, gossamer, lily-white, hummingbird, roucoulement, poppy, daisy, calypso, lunula, lamb, dove and 1526 more...
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Superlatives
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eggplantia5's Words
scintillate, marvel, cranberry, oscillate, triumph, bamboozle, grimace, magical, book, hexagon, cipher, compendium and 2727 more...
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Malachi_Constant's Words
triumverate, pandemic, parsnip, delineate, zamboni, parka, laser, swoop, malevolent, benevolent, fracas, tipsy and 372 more...
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Basic English Vocabulary
Very basic words for ESL students.
contemplate, container, consumer, consultant, consensus, conscious, conscience, connection, confusion, confront, conflict, confident and 4334 more...
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Sweet Smoke of Rhetoric
The ones with which I flavor my speech, and the ones I love to find peppered in literature.
perspicacious, acerbic, vituperation, loquacious, castigate, vitriolic, scintillating, provenance, frolic, attendant, pursuant, epistemology and 313 more...
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hifi_del_norte's Words
vegetable, spatula, bang, fluctuate, carnage, simple, audio, hi-fi, empanada, bonnie, gazpacho, memoirs and 108 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for quite.
yarb See succinct summary on adverbs of degree. May 4, 2010
wordlover42 Quite has always seemed like a very proper, classic "British" word to me. Jun 20, 2009
Prolagus Thank you all, Wordies! Sep 22, 2008
rolig Excellent, yarb. Sep 22, 2008
yarb Quite so, rolig.
Quite can mean somewhat, to a certain extent, partially, i.e. not entirely - e.g, a movie which was "quite good" would be 6/10; something which is "quite important" would be the second or third thing you do; if you were not quite ready, you would be ready soon.
Also, quite can mean "entirely". In this sense it's almost never heard in North America (in my experience). For example, "I've had quite enough of your unpleasantness" = "I've had enough!", or "that meal was quite exquisite" = "that meal was as exquisite as could be". This is fairly common in the UK (and presumably other English-speaking countries).
"Quite so" = "exactly so, yes, you're right, I agree 100%".
Quite can also be deprecatory. If something was expected to be good, and you describe it afterwards as "quite good", you're slighting it. E.g. "So - what did you think of Madonna tonight?" "Oh, yes. She was quite good". = She was actually pretty average.
Finally, "quite the something" means "very much that something:
"'Quite' is quite a confusing word" = it's more confusing than most words.
"'Quite' is quite the confusing word" = it's a very confusing word - more so than most! Sep 22, 2008
rolig In the negative - "not quite" - always means "not entirely" or "almost entirely" (as opposed to "not at all"). Personally, I think I use "quite" to mean both "to a certain degree (more than a little)" and "utterly", depending on the context:
"The movie was quite good." "She did quite well on her exam." (In both cases, this means better than merely good but not excellent.)
"Now that's quite interesting!" "You're quite wrong about that!" (Here it means "completely".)
But the use of "quite" as a response to mean, "I agree with you" is non-U.S. (i.e. British and Canadian, in my experience):
– "I think we'll have to discuss this later."
– "Yes, quite."
Although I am an American, I haven't lived in the States for about 8 years, watch a lot of British TV, and spent my late 20s and early 30s in Toronto, so I really don't know what my "native" speech is anymore. Sep 22, 2008
Prolagus Is there a difference in the way this word is used among different English-speaking countries? (def. 1 vs def. 2) Sep 21, 2008