QUITE

Pronunciation (US):

(GB):

IPA (US):

 Dictionary entry overview: What does quite mean? 

• QUITE (adverb)
  The adverb QUITE has 4 senses:

1. to a degree (not used with a negative)

2. to the greatest extent; completely

3. of an unusually noticeable or exceptional or remarkable kind (not used with a negative)

4. actually or truly or to an extreme

  Familiarity information: QUITE used as an adverb is uncommon.

 Dictionary entry details 

• QUITE (adverb)

Sense 1

Meaning:

To a degree (not used with a negative)

Synonyms:

quite; rather

Context example:

quite rich

Sense 2

Meaning:

To the greatest extent; completely

Context example:

did not quite make it

Sense 3

Meaning:

Of an unusually noticeable or exceptional or remarkable kind (not used with a negative)

Synonyms:

quite; quite a; quite an

Context example:

we've had quite an afternoon

Sense 4

Meaning:

Actually or truly or to an extreme

Context example:

Quite so!

 Context examples 

Later on, in the fall of the year, he saved John Thornton’s life in quite another fashion.

(The Call of the Wild, by Jack London)

You look quite out of spirits!

(Fairy Tales, by The Brothers Grimm)

This was quite a female case, and it would be highly absurd in him, who could be of no use at home, to shut himself up.

(Persuasion, by Jane Austen)

Its legs were quite as long as the tiger had said, and its body covered with coarse black hair.

(The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, by L. Frank Baum)

I didn’t quite like that, Mr. Holmes.

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

That is the man who is after me to-night Watson, and that is the man who is quite unaware that we are after him.

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

I opened the glass-door in the breakfast-room: the shrubbery was quite still: the black frost reigned, unbroken by sun or breeze, through the grounds.

(Jane Eyre, by Charlotte Brontë)

“You're quite a sailor, I suppose?” I said to Em'ly.

(David Copperfield, by Charles Dickens)

The cold side is still quite toasty by Earthly standards, with an average of 2,400 to 2,600 degrees Fahrenheit (1,300 to 1,400 Celsius), and the hot side averages 4,200 degrees Fahrenheit (2,300 Celsius).

(Lava or Not, Exoplanet 55 Cancri e Likely to have Atmosphere, NASA)

Researchers say in a new study that the TRAPPIST-1 star is quite old: between 5.4 and 9.8 billion years.

(TRAPPIST-1 is Older Than Our Solar System, NASA/JPL)