Amplify

How to spell amplify

7 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce amplify

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does amplify mean?

1. verbTo make something louder, stronger, or more intense.
2. verbTo expand on a statement or idea by adding more detail.

Amplify in a sentence

• A good microphone will amplify even a quiet voice across the hall.

• The report asked the manager to amplify her brief recommendation with examples.

• Social media can amplify a small complaint into a national story.

• The lecturer paused to amplify the point that students had found confusing.

Where does amplify come from?

Language of origin: Latin

The word descends from the Latin amplificare, meaning 'to enlarge' or 'to make greater', which was built from amplus, meaning 'large', 'spacious', or 'abundant', and facere, the everyday Latin verb 'to make' or 'to do'. So at its root, to amplify is quite literally to 'make large'. It travelled into English through Old French amplifier in the late 1400s, at first carrying the broad sense of expanding or enlarging something, including expanding on an argument in speech or writing. The narrower modern meaning of boosting the strength of a sound or an electrical signal arrived much later, becoming common with the rise of electronics and the device we still call an amplifier. The shared -ify ending links it to a whole family of 'make' verbs such as clarify, magnify, and intensify, all of which trace back to the same Latin facere.

How the word is built

• ampl- (from Latin amplus: large, ample)
• -ify (from facere: to make, so 'to make larger')