rank.
Strong; powerful; capable of acting or being used with great effect; energetic; vigorous; headstrong.
Meaning & usage
Strong; powerful; capable of acting or being used with great effect; energetic; vigorous; headstrong. Strong in growth; growing with vigour or rapidity, hence, coarse or gross.
rank grass
rank weeds
Strong; powerful; capable of acting or being used with great effect; energetic; vigorous; headstrong. Strong in growth; growing with vigour or rapidity, hence, coarse or gross. Causing strong growth; producing luxuriantly; rich and fertile.
rank land
Strong; powerful; capable of acting or being used with great effect; energetic; vigorous; headstrong. Strong in growth; growing with vigour or rapidity, hence, coarse or gross. Suffering from overgrowth or hypertrophy; plethoric.
Strong; powerful; capable of acting or being used with great effect; energetic; vigorous; headstrong. Strong to the senses; offensive; noisome.
Strong; powerful; capable of acting or being used with great effect; energetic; vigorous; headstrong. Strong to the senses; offensive; noisome. Gross, disgusting, foul.
Strong; powerful; capable of acting or being used with great effect; energetic; vigorous; headstrong. Headstrong; difficult to control.
Having a very strong, bad taste or odor.
Your gym clothes are rank, bro – when'd you last wash 'em?
complete, unmitigated, utter.
rank treason
rank nonsense
lustful; lascivious
Where this word comes from
From Middle English rank (“strong, proud”), from Old English ranc (“proud, haughty, arrogant, insolent, forward, overbearing, showy, ostentatious, splendid, bold, valiant, noble, brave, strong, full-grown, mature”), from Proto-West Germanic *rank, from Proto-Germanic *rankaz (“straight”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₃reǵ- (“straight, direct”). Cognate with Dutch rank (“slender, slim”), Low German rank (“slender, projecting, lank”), Danish rank (“straight, erect, slender”), Swedish rank (“slender, shaky, wonky”), Icelandic rakkur (“straight, slender, bold, valiant”). The sense referring to taste or odor is possibly influenced by rancor.
Quickly, eagerly, impetuously.
Where this word comes from
From Middle English rank (“strong, proud”), from Old English ranc (“proud, haughty, arrogant, insolent, forward, overbearing, showy, ostentatious, splendid, bold, valiant, noble, brave, strong, full-grown, mature”), from Proto-West Germanic *rank, from Proto-Germanic *rankaz (“straight”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₃reǵ- (“straight, direct”). Cognate with Dutch rank (“slender, slim”), Low German rank (“slender, projecting, lank”), Danish rank (“straight, erect, slender”), Swedish rank (“slender, shaky, wonky”), Icelandic rakkur (“straight, slender, bold, valiant”). The sense referring to taste or odor is possibly influenced by rancor.
A row of people or things organized in a grid pattern, often soldiers.
The front rank kneeled to reload while the second rank fired over their heads.
One of the eight horizontal lines of squares on a chessboard (i.e., those identified by a number).
The value of a playing card.
The ranks are 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, Jack, Queen, King, and Ace.
In a pipe organ, a set of pipes of a certain quality for which each pipe corresponds to one key or pedal.
One's position in a list sorted by a shared property such as physical location, population, popularity, or quality.
Based on your test scores, you have a rank of 23.
The fancy hotel was of the first rank.
The level of one's position in a class-based society.
A category of people, such as those who share an occupation or belong to an organisation.
a membership drawn from the ranks of wealthy European businessmen
A hierarchical level in an organization such as the military.
Private First Class (PFC) is the second-lowest rank in the Marines.
He rose up through the ranks of the company, from mailroom clerk to CEO.
A level in a scientific taxonomy system.
Phylum is the taxonomic rank below kingdom and above class.
The dimensionality of an array (computing) or tensor.
The maximal number of linearly independent columns (or rows) of a matrix.
The maximum quantity of D-linearly independent elements of a module (over an integral domain D).
The size of any basis of a given matroid.
Where this word comes from
From Middle English rank (“line, row”), from Old French ranc, rang, reng (“line, row, rank”) (Modern French rang), from Frankish *hring (“ring”), from Proto-Germanic *hringaz (“something bent or curved”). Displaced native Old English hād (“rank, status”). Akin to Old High German (h)ring, Old Frisian hring, Old English hring, hrincg (“ring”), Old Norse hringr (“ring, circle, queue, sword; ship”). Doublet of ring and rink.
To place abreast or in a line.
To have a ranking.
Their defense ranked third in the league.
To assign a suitable place in a class or order; to classify.
To take the rank of; to outrank.
Where this word comes from
From Middle English rank (“line, row”), from Old French ranc, rang, reng (“line, row, rank”) (Modern French rang), from Frankish *hring (“ring”), from Proto-Germanic *hringaz (“something bent or curved”). Displaced native Old English hād (“rank, status”). Akin to Old High German (h)ring, Old Frisian hring, Old English hring, hrincg (“ring”), Old Norse hringr (“ring, circle, queue, sword; ship”). Doublet of ring and rink.
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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.