INSTANTANEOUS

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does instantaneous mean? 

• INSTANTANEOUS (adjective)
  The adjective INSTANTANEOUS has 1 sense:

1. occurring with no delay

  Familiarity information: INSTANTANEOUS used as an adjective is very rare.

 Dictionary entry details 

• INSTANTANEOUS (adjective)

Sense 1

Meaning:

Occurring with no delay

Synonyms:

instant; instantaneous

Context example:

instant gratification

Similar:

fast (acting or moving or capable of acting or moving quickly)

Derivation:

instant (a particular point in time)

instantaneousness (the quickness of action or occurrence)

 Context examples 

His death had certainly been instantaneous and painless.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

Sir Thomas could not give so instantaneous and unqualified a consent.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)

There was an instantaneous scattering of the four men who had carried it in, and from safe perches on top the wall they prepared to watch the performance.

(The Call of the Wild, by Jack London)

"Wiki-Wiki," published in Warren's Monthly, was an instantaneous success.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

It seemed as if there were an instantaneous impression in her favour, as if his eyes received the truth from hers, and all that had passed of good in her feelings were at once caught and honoured.

(Emma, by Jane Austen)

The colour now rushed into Elizabeth's cheeks in the instantaneous conviction of its being a letter from the nephew, instead of the aunt; and she was undetermined whether most to be pleased that he explained himself at all, or offended that his letter was not rather addressed to herself; when her father continued: You look conscious.

(Pride and Prejudice, by Jane Austen)

Mrs. Jennings, who had watched them with pleasure while they were talking, and who expected to see the effect of Miss Dashwood's communication, in such an instantaneous gaiety on Colonel Brandon's side, as might have become a man in the bloom of youth, of hope and happiness, saw him, with amazement, remain the whole evening more serious and thoughtful than usual.

(Sense and Sensibility, by Jane Austen)

And yet there was the dead man and there the revolver bullet, which had mushroomed out, as soft-nosed bullets will, and so inflicted a wound which must have caused instantaneous death.

(The Return of Sherlock Holmes, by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle)

And to add confusion to confusion, there was the servant, an unceasing menace, that appeared noiselessly at his shoulder, a dire Sphinx that propounded puzzles and conundrums demanding instantaneous solution.

(Martin Eden, by Jack London)

There were not fewer smiles at the Parsonage than at the Park on this change in Edmund; Miss Crawford looked very lovely in hers, and entered with such an instantaneous renewal of cheerfulness into the whole affair as could have but one effect on him.

(Mansfield Park, by Jane Austen)