Impatient

How to spell impatient

9 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce impatient

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does impatient mean?

1. adjectiveEasily annoyed by delay or restless to have something happen quickly.

Impatient in a sentence

• The commuters grew impatient as the delayed train sat on the platform.

• She felt impatient waiting for the bank to approve her mortgage.

Where does impatient come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word comes from the Latin impatiens, which combined the negative prefix in-, meaning 'not', with patiens, the present participle of pati, 'to suffer, bear, or endure'. So at root an impatient person is literally someone who cannot endure or put up with delay. The same pati gives us 'patient' (both the calm temperament and the person under a doctor's care), as well as 'passive' and 'passion', all sharing the idea of undergoing or suffering something. English took impatient in through Old French during the late 1300s, keeping the Latin sense of being unable to wait. Knowing the buried word 'patient' inside it helps with the spelling, since the tricky -tient ending is just 'patient' with the prefix attached.

How the word is built

• im- (not)
• patient (from Latin patiens: enduring, suffering)