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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

obtain.

To get hold of; to gain possession of, to procure; to acquire, in any way.

6 characters2 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

verb/əbˈteɪn/
  1. To get hold of; to gain possession of, to procure; to acquire, in any way.

    transitive
    obtain permission
    obtain information
  2. To secure (that) a specific objective or state of affairs be reached.

    intransitive · obsolete
  3. To prevail, be victorious; to succeed.

    intransitive · obsolete
  4. To hold; to keep, possess or occupy.

    obsolete · transitive
  5. To exist or be the case; to hold true, be in force.

    especially · intransitive
Where this word comes from

From Middle English obteinen, from Anglo-Norman obtenir, optiner et al., and Middle French obtenir, from Latin obtinēre (“to gain, achieve, succeed, possess”), from ob- + tenēre (“to hold”).

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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.