ambitious

B1 Topic:Describing Qualities

US /æmˈbɪʃ.əs/ See IPA manual

Freq #6450

Meanings

1

adj
Having a strong desire to be successful, powerful, or rich.

She is an ambitious young lawyer who hopes to run her own firm one day.
2

adj
Needing a lot of effort, skill, or money to succeed; hard to achieve.

The company set itself the ambitious goal of doubling its sales in a year.

Thesaurus

Synonyms

1 adj · having a strong desire to... aspiring

2 adj · needing a lot of effort,... challenging grand

Opposites

nonambitiousunambitious

Word family

Derived forms ambitiouslyambitiousnesshyperambitiousoverambitioussuperambitiousunderambitious

Related forms ambition

Appears in

Phrases (1)

See all

ambitious plan
a plan that aims to achieve something bold or large in scope

Adjective + noun

Etymology

From Middle English ambitious, from Middle French ambitieus, from Latin ambitiosus, from ambitio; see ambition. Compare with French ambitieux. By surface analysis, ambit + -ious.

*h₁ey- Proto-Indo-European ambitious Middle English ambitieus Middle French ambitiosus Latin

View etymology graph ->

Topics

Describing Qualities

External links

# ambitious

**Type:** Word
**Level:** B1
**Part of speech:** adj
**IPA (US):** /æmˈbɪʃ.əs/
**Frequency rank:** 6450

## Meanings
1. Having a strong desire to be successful, powerful, or rich.
2. Needing a lot of effort, skill, or money to succeed; hard to achieve.

## Examples
- She is an ambitious young lawyer who hopes to run her own firm one day.
- The company set itself the ambitious goal of doubling its sales in a year.

## Antonyms
- nonambitious
- unambitious

## Derived Forms
- ambitiously
- ambitiousness
- hyperambitious
- overambitious
- superambitious
- underambitious

## Related Forms
- ambition

## Roots and Affixes
- Root: *h₁ey-
- Root: ambitious
- Root: ambitieus
- Root: ambitiosus
- Affix: -ious - full of

## Etymology
From Middle English ambitious, from Middle French ambitieus, from Latin ambitiosus, from ambitio; see ambition. Compare with French ambitieux. By surface analysis, ambit + -ious.

## AI Etymology
Ambitious comes from Middle English ambitious, from Middle French ambitieus, from Latin ambitiosus, from ambitio; see ambition. Compare with French ambitieux. By surface analysis, ambit plus -ious. The historical line also includes Proto-Indo-European *h₁ey-. The analysis is mainly morphological: the modern adjectival form is built from the named base and affix.

## Topics
- Describing Qualities

markdown