Transmit

How to spell transmit

8 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce transmit

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does transmit mean?

1. verbTo send out or pass on something such as a signal, message, or condition from one place or person to another.

Transmit in a sentence

• The tower can transmit a clear radio signal across the whole valley.

• Infected animals can transmit the disease to humans.

Where does transmit come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word comes from the Latin verb transmittere, which combined trans, meaning 'across' or 'over', with mittere, meaning 'to send' or 'to let go'. The literal idea was to send something across from one place or person to another, whether that was a message, an object, or even an inheritance. English took it up in the fifteenth century, at first for handing something on, and the meaning broadened naturally as technology arrived, so that radio waves, electrical signals, and later digital data could all be transmitted. The same mittere root sits inside a large family of English words, including 'mission', 'admit', 'submit', and 'permit', which all share the idea of sending or letting go. Notice that the spelling keeps a single t before the ending, since the base ends in the single t of mittere; the doubling only appears in inflected forms such as transmitted.

How the word is built

• trans- (across)
• mit (send, from Latin mittere)