Animated

How to spell animated

8 letters · 4 syllables

How to pronounce animated

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does animated mean?

1. adjectiveFull of life, energy, and visible enthusiasm.
2. adjectiveMade using animation, in which drawings or models are made to appear to move.

Animated in a sentence

• The meeting turned into an animated debate about the budget.

• The studio released a new animated feature for the holidays.

• She grew animated whenever the conversation moved to her travels.

• Children watched an animated series about talking robots.

Where does animated come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word grows from the Latin noun anima, which literally meant 'breath' and, by extension, the breath of life or the soul that animals and people carry. From it Latin formed the verb animare, 'to give life to' or 'to fill with breath', and its past participle animatus described something that had been brought to life. English took up the verb 'animate' in the late 1500s and the adjective 'animated' followed, first carrying the idea of something genuinely alive and then, more loosely, the idea of something lively and full of spirit. The very same anima root sits inside familiar relatives such as 'animal', 'animosity', and 'unanimous' (literally 'of one mind'). In the twentieth century the word gained its film sense, since cartoon drawings are quite literally given the illusion of life frame by frame. Spelling it is mostly a matter of remembering the single n and the unstressed middle vowel, which sounds like a faint 'i' but is easy to drop.

How the word is built

• anim- (from anima: breath, life, soul)
• -ate (verb suffix)
• -ed (past participle/adjective ending)