Opposite

How to spell opposite

8 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce opposite

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does opposite mean?

1. adjectiveCompletely different from, or contrary to, something else.
2. nounA person or thing that is completely different from another.
3. prepositionFacing or directly across from a place or person.

Opposite in a sentence

• adjective

  The two managers held the opposite view on the merger.

• noun

  Cold is the opposite of hot.

• preposition

  The bakery sits directly opposite the train station.

• adjective

  Heating the metal had the opposite effect to what they expected.

• noun

  Her calm reaction was the exact opposite of what he had feared.

• preposition

  She chose the seat opposite him at the long table.

Where does opposite come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin oppositus, the past participle of opponere, which meant 'to set against' or 'to place in the way'. That verb was built from the prefix ob-, meaning 'against' or 'facing', and ponere, meaning 'to place' or 'to put', so the literal idea was something positioned directly facing or contrary to another thing. English took it in during the 1300s by way of Old French, keeping both the 'facing' sense and the 'contrary' sense we still use today. The same ponere root quietly powers a whole family of English words, including 'position', 'compose', 'deposit', and 'opponent', which shares the very same ob- prefix. Knowing that the front of the word is the 'ob-' that softened to 'op-' (doubling the p before the p of ponere) helps explain the double p and the single, unstressed -site ending that often trips writers up.

How the word is built

• op- (from ob-: against)
• posit (from ponere: to place)
• -ite (adjective/noun suffix)