EXEMPT

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does exempt mean? 

• EXEMPT (adjective)
  The adjective EXEMPT has 2 senses:

1. (of persons) freed from or not subject to an obligation or liability (as e.g. taxes) to which others or other things are subject

2. (of goods or funds) not subject to taxation

  Familiarity information: EXEMPT used as an adjective is rare.

• EXEMPT (verb)
  The verb EXEMPT has 2 senses:

1. grant relief or an exemption from a rule or requirement to

2. grant exemption or release to

  Familiarity information: EXEMPT used as a verb is rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• EXEMPT (adjective)

Sense 1

Meaning:

(of persons) freed from or not subject to an obligation or liability (as e.g. taxes) to which others or other things are subject

Context example:

only the very poorest citizens should be exempt from income taxes

Similar:

excused (granted exemption)

immune (secure against)

privileged (not subject to usual rules or penalties)

Antonym:

nonexempt ((of persons) not exempt from an obligation or liability)

Sense 2

Meaning:

(of goods or funds) not subject to taxation

Synonyms:

exempt; nontaxable

Context example:

income exempt from taxation

Similar:

duty-free (exempt from duty)

tax-exempt; tax-free; untaxed ((of goods or funds) not taxed)

unratable (not subject to locally assessed property taxes)

Also:

exempt ((of persons) freed from or not subject to an obligation or liability (as e.g. taxes) to which others or other things are subject)

• EXEMPT (verb)

Present simple: I / you / we / they exempt    ... he / she / it exempts   
Past simple: exempted   
Past participle: exempted   
-ing form: exempting   

Sense 1

Meaning:

Grant relief or an exemption from a rule or requirement to

Classified under:

Verbs of political and social activities and events

Synonyms:

exempt; free; relieve

Context example:

She exempted me from the exam

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "exempt"):

derestrict (make free from restrictions)

deregulate (lift the regulations on)

dispense (grant a dispensation; grant an exemption)

forgive (absolve from payment)

spare (save or relieve from an experience or action)

Sentence frame:

Somebody ----s somebody PP

Antonym:

enforce (ensure observance of laws and rules)

Derivation:

exemption (immunity from an obligation or duty)

Sense 2

Meaning:

Grant exemption or release to

Classified under:

Verbs of telling, asking, ordering, singing

Synonyms:

excuse; exempt; let off; relieve

Context example:

Please excuse me from this class

Hypernyms (to "exempt" is one way to...):

absolve; free (let off the hook)

Troponyms (each of the following is one way to "exempt"):

frank (exempt by means of an official pass or letter, as from customs or other checks)

Sentence frames:

Somebody ----s somebody
Somebody ----s somebody PP

Sentence example:

Sam cannot exempt Sue

 Context examples 

An indication that a device is exempt from direct marking requirements.

(Exempt from Direct Marking, NCI Thesaurus)

A medical device that is exempt from FDA premarket notification requirements.

(Exempt Device, NCI Thesaurus)

The device is exempt from Direct Marking requirements under 21 CFR 801.50.

(Exempt from Direct Marking, Food and Drug Administration)

An HDE is similar in form and content to a premarket approval (PMA) but is exempt from the effectiveness requirements of a PMA.

(Humanitarian Device Exemption, NCI Thesaurus)

I answered, “that his excellency’s prudence, quality, and fortune, had exempted him from those defects, which folly and beggary had produced in others.”

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

But through the whole period during which I was the slave of my creature I allowed myself to be governed by the impulses of the moment; and my present sensations strongly intimated that the fiend would follow me and exempt my family from the danger of his machinations.

(Frankenstein, by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley)

It would be impossible to explain to Eleanor the suspicions, from which the other had, in all likelihood, been hitherto happily exempt; nor could she therefore, in her presence, search for those proofs of the general's cruelty, which however they might yet have escaped discovery, she felt confident of somewhere drawing forth, in the shape of some fragmented journal, continued to the last gasp.

(Northanger Abbey, by Jane Austen)

I told him, “that a first or chief minister of state, who was the person I intended to describe, was the creature wholly exempt from joy and grief, love and hatred, pity and anger; at least, makes use of no other passions, but a violent desire of wealth, power, and titles; that he applies his words to all uses, except to the indication of his mind; that he never tells a truth but with an intent that you should take it for a lie; nor a lie, but with a design that you should take it for a truth; that those he speaks worst of behind their backs are in the surest way of preferment; and whenever he begins to praise you to others, or to yourself, you are from that day forlorn. The worst mark you can receive is a promise, especially when it is confirmed with an oath; after which, every wise man retires, and gives over all hopes.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

But great allowances should be given to a king, who lives wholly secluded from the rest of the world, and must therefore be altogether unacquainted with the manners and customs that most prevail in other nations: the want of which knowledge will ever produce many prejudices, and a certain narrowness of thinking, from which we, and the politer countries of Europe, are wholly exempted.

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)

Happy people, who enjoy so many living examples of ancient virtue, and have masters ready to instruct them in the wisdom of all former ages! but happiest, beyond all comparison, are those excellent struldbrugs, who, being born exempt from that universal calamity of human nature, have their minds free and disengaged, without the weight and depression of spirits caused by the continual apprehensions of death!

(Gulliver's Travels into several remote nations of the world, by Jonathan Swift)