Neat Meaning
/ˈniːt/Definition, CEFR level B1, pronunciation, examples, and quiz.
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Definition
adjClean, tidy; free from dirt or impurities.
adjFree from contaminants; unadulterated, undiluted. Particularly of liquor and cocktails; see usage below.
Sentence Examples
No one is so poor that he cannot afford to be neat.
Keep your room neat and tidy.
She kept her desk extremely neat.
CEFR Practice Quiz
Her handwriting was so ____ that each letter was perfectly formed and readable.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
She always keeps her desk very ____ and organized with everything in its place.
Word Origin & History
From Middle English nete, net, nette, from Anglo-Norman neit (“good, desirable, clean”), a variant of Old French net, nette (“clean, clear, pure”), from Latin nitidus (“gleaming”), derived from nitēre (“to shine”). Doublet of net and nitid. Cognate with German nett (“nice, kind”). Compare also nait.
Literary Quotations & Historical Citations
"Then his sallow face brightened, for the hall had been carefully furnished, and was very clean. ¶ There was a neat hat-and-umbrella stand, and the stranger's weary feet fell soft on a good, serviceable dark-red drugget, which matched in colour the flock-paper on the walls."
— 1913, Mrs. [Marie] Belloc Lowndes, chapter II, in The Lodger, London: Methuen, →OCLC; republished in Novels of Mystery: The Lodger; The Story of Ivy; What Really Happened, New York, N.Y.: Longmans, Green and Co., […], [1933], →OCLC, page 0091:
"A very neat old woman, still in her good outdoor coat and best beehive hat, was sitting at a polished mahogany table on whose surface there were several scored scratches so deep that a triangular piece of the veneer had come cleanly away,[…]."
— 1963, Margery Allingham, “Foreword”, in The China Governess: A Mystery, London: Chatto & Windus, →OCLC:
"From this same Head, this Fountain-head divine, / For different Palates springs a different Wine! / In which no Tricks, to strengthen, or to thin ’em— / Neat as imported—no French Brandy in em’—"
— 1756, David Garrick, Catharine and Petruchio, London: J. & R. Tonson and S. Draper, Prologue:
"Why without telling the least title of Falshood, within the space of the last Week’s Play, the Gains of Count Cog, really amounted to no less than Twenty Thousand Pounds Sterling neat Money."
— 1720, William Bond, chapter 4, in The History of the Life and Adventures of Mr. Duncan Campbell, London: E. Curll, pages 55–56:
"Dr. Swift […] says, in his short view of the state of Ireland, that the whole cash of that kingdom amounted to 500,000 l. that out of this they remitted every year a neat million to England, and had scarce any other source to compensate themselves from […]"
— 1752, David Hume, Political Discourses, Edinburgh: A. Kincaid & A. Donaldson, Discourse 5, page 81:
Explore More B1 Vocabulary Words
CEFR Practice Quiz
Her handwriting was so ____ that each letter was perfectly formed and readable.
CEFR Practice Quiz (Alternate)
She always keeps her desk very ____ and organized with everything in its place.