tense

CEFRB1

/tɛns/

adjective · noun

Türkçe translations

Translating…

In plain English

  1. 01

    adjective

    Nervous or unable to relax.

  2. 02

    noun

    A form of a verb showing time.

Examples

  • I feel tense and agitated when I have too much work to do.

  • What Jane said made the atmosphere less tense.

At a glance

Sits at B1 on the CEFR scale

Senses
5
Parts of speech
2
Citations
5
Synonyms
3

Deep Dive

adjective

Extra meanings

  1. A grammatical aspect.

  2. An inflected form of a verb that indicates tense.

noun

Extra meaning

  1. The property of indicating the point in time at which an action or state of being occurs or exists.

More examples

In context

  • Dyirbal verbs are not inflected for tense.

  • English only has a past tense and a non-past tense; it has no future tense.

  • The "simple present" tense in English can have several meanings.

Synonyms

Quick test

Two questions on this entry. Nothing is scored.

Question 1 · Quick check

The atmosphere in the room was blank before the final exam, with everyone feeling nervous.

Practise this properly in the app, where the word comes back before you forget it.

Nearby

Origin

adjective

From Middle English tens, from Old French tens (modern French temps), from Latin tempus. Doublet of tempo and tempus.