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say it: im-PAWRT
import is a noun and verb meaning "commodities (goods or services) bought from a foreign country". It carries 8 recorded senses.
commodities (goods or services) bought from a foreign country
an imported person brought from a foreign country
“the lead role was played by an import from Sweden”
“they are descendants of indentured importees”
the message that is intended or expressed or signified
“what is the meaning of this sentence”
“the significance of a red traffic light”
“the signification of Chinese characters”
“the import of his announcement was ambiguous”
a meaning that is not expressly stated but can be inferred
“the significance of his remark became clear only later”
“the expectation was spread both by word and by implication”
having important effects or influence
“decisions of great consequence are made by the president himself”
“virtue is of more moment than security”
“that result is of no consequence”
Forms marked · are formed by the regular rule rather than recorded in the source data. English keeps a few hundred irregulars and the rest follow the pattern, so the rule is right far more often than not — but it is a rule, and the mark says so.
Definitions, synonyms and semantic relations for import come from Princeton University’s WordNet. The pronunciation comes from the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. Commonness is measured against a corpus of everyday English. Full sources and licences.