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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

ascertain.

To find out definitely; to discover or establish.

9 characters3 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

verb/ˌæsəˈteɪn/Received-Pronunciation/ˌæsɚˈteɪn/Canada, General-American/ˌæsəˈtæɪn/Australia, New-Zealand
  1. To find out definitely; to discover or establish.

    transitive
    As soon as we ascertain what the situation is, we can plan how to proceed.
  2. To make (someone) certain or confident about something; to inform.

    obsolete · transitive
  3. To look for something lost.

    Yorkshire · dated · intransitive
  4. To establish, to prove.

    archaic · transitive
  5. To ensure or effect.

    archaic · transitive
Where this word comes from

From Middle English acerteynen, from Old French acertener, from a- (“to, towards”) + certener (“make sure of”), from the adjective certain, from Latin certus (“certain, fixed”). Compare to Spanish acertar.

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.