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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

explosive.

Able to, or likely to, explode.

9 characters3 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

adj/ɛkˈspləʊsɪv/Received-Pronunciation/ɪkˈspləʊsɪv/Received-Pronunciation/ɛkˈsploʊsɪv/Canada, General-American/ɪkˈsploʊsɪv/Canada, General-American
  1. Able to, or likely to, explode.

    an explosive device
  2. Having the character of an explosion.

    an explosive fire
  3. Having the character of an explosion. Of a specific cellular automaton rule, tending to exhibit infinite and unpredictable growth when starting from finite random patterns.

  4. Rapidly accelerating.

    figuratively
    explosive movements
  5. Shocking; startling.

    figuratively
    an explosive accusation
  6. Easily driven to anger, usually with reference to a person.

    slang
    He has an explosive personality.
  7. Synonym of plosive.

    archaic
    the explosive consonants
Where this word comes from

From Latin explōs-, stem of the perfect passive participle of explōdō + the suffix -ive.

noun/ɛkˈspləʊsɪv/Received-Pronunciation/ɪkˈspləʊsɪv/Received-Pronunciation/ɛkˈsploʊsɪv/Canada, General-American/ɪkˈsploʊsɪv/Canada, General-American
  1. Any explosive substance.

  2. A plosive.

    dated
Where this word comes from

From Latin explōs-, stem of the perfect passive participle of explōdō + the suffix -ive.

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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.