Standard Lemma guide

unimportant

adj · 3 senses · updated from the 2026-07-25 local source snapshot

Definitions and examples are grouped by meaning. Pronunciation, history, word forms, translations, descendants, synonyms, antonyms, derived terms, and related words appear whenever the source provides them.

Sound

Pronunciation

Each Play button uses your device's default local English voice, or a natural local fallback. The selected voice name appears after playback. This is synthesized speech, not a source recording.

  • Received-Pronunciation: /ˌʌnɪmˈpɔːtənt/
  • General-American: /ˌʌnɪmˈpɔɹtənt/
  • /ˌʌnɪmˈpo(ː)ɹtənt/ rhotic, without the horse–hoarse merger
  • /ˌʌnɪmˈpoə.tənt/ non-rhotic, without the horse–hoarse merger
  • US: Recorded audio is listed in the source snapshot.
  • CMU ARPABET: AH0 N IH0 M P AO1 R T AH0 N T Digits mark lexical stress: 1 primary, 2 secondary, 0 unstressed.

1

adj

Meaning 1

petty; not important or noteworthy

Definition source: English Wiktionary via Wiktextract

No example sentence was provided for this meaning.

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: base, contemptible, floccinaucinihilipilificatious, foolish, for the birds, futile, frivolous, idle, ignorable, immaterial, inconsequential, inconsiderable, indifferent, insignificant, like a fart in a windstorm, meager, mean, minor, miserable, negligible, nothingburger, nondescript, null, paltry, petty, picayune, picayunish, piddling, piddly, pissant, pissass, piteous, pitiful, pointless, silly, simple, slight, ticky-tacky, tin-pot, trifling, trivial, two-bit, unimportant, unweighty, vain, worthless, wretched

Antonyms: important

2

adjective

Meaning 2

not important

Definition source: Princeton WordNet 3.0

Examples

  • a relatively unimportant feature of the system
  • the question seems unimportant

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: none provided

Antonyms: important

3

adjective

Meaning 3

devoid of importance, meaning, or force

Definition source: Princeton WordNet 3.0

No example sentence was provided for this meaning.

Meaning relationships

Synonyms: insignificant

Antonyms: none provided

History

Etymology

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *né Proto-Indo-European *n̥- Proto-Germanic *un- Proto-West Germanic *un- Old English un- Middle English un- English un- English important English unimportant From un- + important.

Across languages

Translations

43 source translations are retained for this English entry.

  • Bulgarian: маловажен (malovažen) — not important or noteworthy
  • Catalan: irrelevant — not important or noteworthy
  • Catalan: intranscendent — not important or noteworthy
  • Chinese Mandarin: 不重要 (bù zhòngyào) — not important or noteworthy
  • Czech: nedůležitý — not important or noteworthy
  • Danish: uvigtig — not important or noteworthy
  • Dutch: onbelangrijk — not important or noteworthy
  • Esperanto: malgrava — not important or noteworthy
  • Finnish: vähämerkityksellinen — not important or noteworthy
  • Finnish: vähäinen — not important or noteworthy
  • French: sans importance — not important or noteworthy
  • Galician: intranscendente — not important or noteworthy
  • Galician: irrelevante — not important or noteworthy
  • Georgian: უმნიშვნელო (umnišvnelo) — not important or noteworthy
  • Georgian: არამნიშვნელოვანი (aramnišvnelovani) — not important or noteworthy
  • German: unwichtig — not important or noteworthy
  • Greek: ασήμαντος (asímantos) — not important or noteworthy
  • Hungarian: lényegtelen — not important or noteworthy
  • Hungarian: nem fontos — not important or noteworthy
  • Japanese: 重要でない (jūyō denai) — not important or noteworthy
  • Māori: korokororiki — not important or noteworthy
  • Māori: kūrapa — not important or noteworthy
  • Māori: iti — not important or noteworthy
  • Eastern Mari: изи (izi) — not important or noteworthy
  • Norwegian Bokmål: uviktig — not important or noteworthy
  • Norwegian Nynorsk: uviktig — not important or noteworthy
  • Polish: nieważny — not important or noteworthy
  • Polish: bez znaczenia — not important or noteworthy
  • Portuguese: desimportante — not important or noteworthy
  • Romanian: neimportant — not important or noteworthy
  • Russian: нева́жный (nevážnyj) — not important or noteworthy
  • Serbo-Croatian: неважан — not important or noteworthy
  • Serbo-Croatian: nevažan — not important or noteworthy
  • Spanish: sin importancia — not important or noteworthy
  • Spanish: intranscendente — not important or noteworthy
  • Spanish: de poca monta — not important or noteworthy
  • Spanish: pichiruche — not important or noteworthy
  • Spanish: pichiruchi — not important or noteworthy
  • Spanish: pichirruchi — not important or noteworthy
  • Swedish: oviktig — not important or noteworthy
  • Turkish: önemsiz — not important or noteworthy
  • Ottoman Turkish: یسیر (yesir) — not important or noteworthy
  • Ukrainian: неважли́вий (nevažlývyj) — not important or noteworthy