nocturnal.

Active, occurring, or associated with the night.

Use it for

Words that belong together

• nocturnal animals
• nocturnal sounds

On the page

Nocturnal sounds rose from the trees after the lights went out.

Usage notes

Primary category: horror / gothic. Forms: Normally non-gradable; no ordinary comparative or superlative. Legacy lexical fields mirror sense 1 only. Use numbered sense fields for all meanings. Established modern English lexical item. No separate regional spelling or grammatical inflection entry. Writing functions: atmosphere, description. Commonness: moderately common.