MEANING
1. To change from a liquid into a gas, or cause that change.
2. To disappear as though dissolving into the air, leaving little or nothing behind.
Use it for
describing moisture disappearing from a surface; showing a physical trace drying away; distinguishing liquid loss from crumbling or rottingOffers a concrete image of something dissolving out of presence, especially confidence, hope, or a temporary trace. Writing functions: Transience / Impermanence.
Words that belong together
- water evaporates
- evaporate into the air
- moisture evaporates
On the page
By noon the water in the footprint had evaporated.
Heat from the broken pipe evaporated the thin film of moisture on the tiles.
Her remaining confidence evaporated at the sight of the unopened letter.
When the witnesses withdrew, his expectation of an easy victory evaporated.
Word forms
- Base
- evaporate
- Past tense
- evaporated
- Past participle
- evaporated
- Present participle
- evaporating
Full tense & aspect guide
- Present
- evaporate
- Present continuous
- am/is/are evaporating
- Present perfect
- have/has evaporated
- Present perfect continuous
- have/has been evaporating
- Past
- evaporated
- Past continuous
- was/were evaporating
- Past perfect
- had evaporated
- Past perfect continuous
- had been evaporating
- Future
- will evaporate
- Future continuous
- will be evaporating
- Future perfect
- will have evaporated
- Future perfect continuous
- will have been evaporating
Choose the auxiliary that agrees with your subject. These are constructions of one word, not separate entries.
Usage notes
Verb: evaporate, evaporates, evaporated, evaporated, evaporating. Physical sense is intransitive or transitive; figurative disappearance is usually intransitive. Register: neutral. Commonness: common (dictionary-informed qualitative editorial estimate; not a measured frequency).
Practice this word in a sentenceYour margin notes
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