Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for September 8, 2026 is:





magnanimous • \mag-NAN-uh-mus\ • adjective

Magnanimous is a formal word that means “having or showing a generous and kind nature.”

// She was too magnanimous to resent the unkind words of those grousing about her winning the spelling bee.

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Examples:

“Think before you act or speak. Drive and walk carefully. Be magnanimous and forgiving if others make a boo-boo.” — Georgia Nicols, The Boston Globe, 27 Nov. 2025





Did you know?

When you see anima, animus, or a similar formation in a word, it’s often an indicator of something alive, lively, or spirited. Something described as animated is full of life, for example, and the word animal refers to a living thing. The Latin word anima means “breath” or “soul” and animus means “spirit.” In magnanimous, animus is joined by the Latin word magnus, meaning “great.” Basically meaning “greatness of spirit,” magnanimity is the opposite of selfishness. A truly magnanimous person can lose without complaining and win without gloating, and angry disputes can sometimes be resolved when one side makes a magnanimous gesture toward the other.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for September 7, 2026 is:





gist • \JIST\ • noun

Gist, which almost always appears in the phrase “the gist,” refers to the general or basic meaning of something written or said.

// I found the author’s grandiloquent style of writing intolerable, but I got the gist of the story.

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Examples:

“His daughter dismissed the film they were watching early on, [Tim] Allen explained, because she'd already got the gist of what was going to happen.” — Steven McIntosh, BBC, 1 June 2026





Did you know?

The main point, overarching theme, essence—that’s gist in a nutshell. The gist of gist, if you will. The gist of a conversation, argument, story, or what-have-you is what we rely on when the actual words and details are only imperfectly recalled, inessential, or too voluminous to recount in their entirety. Gist was borrowed from the Anglo-French legal phrase laccion gist (“the action lies/is based [on]”) in the 17th century, and it was originally used in law as a term referring to the foundation or grounds for a legal action without which the action would not be legally sustainable.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for September 6, 2026 is:





inexorable • \i-NEK-suh-ruh-bul\ • adjective

Inexorable is a formal word used to describe something that cannot be stopped or changed.

// For some, the changing autumn foliage is a beautiful yet bittersweet reminder of the inexorable march of time.

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Examples:

“At the summer solstice, the Sun ‘stands still’—the meaning of the Latin solstice—and begins its progression back toward the south. Days shorten, shadows lengthen, and the cold and dreariness of winter return. Europeans across the entire continent have noted this simple and inexorable cycle for millennia. Neolithic monuments such as Ireland’s Newgrange and England’s Stonehenge, both of which date from around 5,000 years ago, were built to mark solstices.” — Thomas A. DuBois, The Conversation, 17 June 2026





Did you know?

You can beseech and implore until you’re blue in the face, but that won’t have any effect on something that’s inexorable. Inexorable, which has been part of the English language since the 1500s, was originally often applied to people, desires, or actions held to be particularly resistant to persuasion (or dissuasion). In Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet, for example, Romeo declares that his “intents” are “more fierce and more inexorable far / Than empty tigers or the roaring sea.” These days, it is usually used to describe the progression of something through time, or toward an end result, commonly modifying nouns like drift, pull, rise, march, decline, or tide. Inexorable comes from the Latin adjective inexorabilis, which is itself a combination of the prefix in-, meaning “not,” plus exorabilis, meaning “pliant.” If you’re wondering whether English has an exorable meaning “capable of being moved by entreaty,” indeed it does, though exorable is far less common than its antonym.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for September 5, 2026 is:





matriculate • \muh-TRIK-yuh-layt\ • verb

To matriculate is to enroll or be enrolled as a student, especially at a college or university.

// She matriculated at the Rhode Island School of Design and began classes in the fall.

// A spokesperson for the college said the school is expected to matriculate approximately 1,000 students for the fall semester.

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Examples:

"Fresh off the heels of graduation from high school, many rising freshmen are choosing to step off of the treadmill for a year before matriculating in college." — DJ Didonna, Time, 13 July 2026





Did you know?

Anybody who has had basic Latin knows that alma mater, a fancy term for the school you attended, comes from a phrase that means "fostering mother." If mater means "mother," then matriculate probably has something to do with a school nurturing you just like good old mom, right? Not exactly. If you go back far enough, matriculate is distantly related to the Latin mater, but its maternal associations were lost long ago—even in terms of Latin history. It is more closely related to the Late Latin word matricula, which means "public roll or register." Matricula has more to do with being enrolled than being mothered, but it is the diminutive form of the Latin noun matrix, which in Late Latin was used in the sense of "list" or "register" and earlier referred to female animals kept for the purposes of breeding.

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for September 4, 2026 is:





apiary • \AY-pee-air-ee\ • noun

Apiary refers to a place where bees are kept, and especially a collection of hives or colonies of bees kept for their honey.

// One of the best parts of having a beekeeper for a sister-in-law is getting fresh jars of local honey from the family apiary.

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Examples:

“The 70-year-old retiree from South Philadelphia ordinarily would avoid bees out of fear, but this spring she suited up for a study on therapeutic beekeeping at the Half Mad Honey apiary in the Navy Yard. Led by Temple University occupational therapy student Meghan Robertson, the project tested if beekeeping could improve mental health and well-being in older adults.” — Kayla Yup, The Philadelphia Inquirer, 28 June 2026





Did you know?

For those who enjoy honey and the fascinating creatures that make it, apiaries are the bee’s knees. The word apiary—which comes ultimately from the Latin word apis, meaning “bee”—can refer to any place where bees are kept, but is used especially for a collection of hives or colonies of bees kept for their honey. Honeybee colonies are highly complex clusters of individuals that function virtually as single organisms (as by a hive mind). Queen bees, capable of laying more than a thousand eggs per day, develop from larvae that are fed solely on royal jelly. Drones are stingless male bees whose one job (they do not gather nectar or pollen) is to mate with the queen. Drones are vastly outnumbered by tens of thousands of female worker bees who do everything else—from foraging and feeding (royal jelly is produced from their pharyngeal glands) to cleaning and defense. In other words, they run the hive.