afloat

Questions about afloat

What is another word for afloat?

It depends which afloat you mean. In the sense “aimlessly drifting”, the synonyms are adrift, aimless, directionless, planless, rudderless, undirected. Across all 3 senses there are 10 distinct synonyms, and they are not interchangeable with each other — this page lists them under the sense each one belongs to.

What is the opposite of afloat?

The recorded antonym is aground. Opposites are sense-specific too: this page shows which meaning each one is the opposite of, because a word rarely has a single opposite that holds for all of its senses.

Why are the synonyms for afloat split into groups?

Because afloat carries 3 recorded senses and each has its own set of substitutes. A single flat list would put words from unrelated meanings side by side with nothing to tell them apart, which is exactly how a writer picks the wrong one. The grouping comes from WordNet's synsets, not from an editorial judgement of ours.

Where do the synonyms for afloat come from?

From Princeton University's WordNet, a lexical database maintained by lexicographers since 1985. A synonym here means a word form that shares a synset with this word — a set of forms interchangeable in one recorded context. Nothing on this page is generated by a language model.

Other views of afloat

• Full entry for afloatAll 3 senses, with examples, usage labels, syllables and pronunciation.
• Rhymes for afloatWords matching from the last stressed vowel onward, grouped by syllable count.
• Thesaurus homeHow WordNet synsets work, and the collections built for synonym work.