sympathise

1. 1.

   share the feelings of; understand the sentiments of

   Synonymssympathize

   Broaderfeel
2. 2.

   to feel or express sympathy or compassion

   Synonymscommiseratesympathize

   Broaderfeel for

   Narrowercondole
3. 3.

   be understanding of

   “You don't need to explain--I understand!”

   Synonymssympathizeempathizeempathiseunderstand

Other forms of sympathise

past tense

sympathised·

present participle

sympathising·

third person

sympathises·

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.

Questions about sympathise

What does sympathise mean?

sympathise means "share the feelings of; understand the sentiments of". That is the primary sense; the word has 3 in total, listed in full on this page.

How many syllables are in sympathise?

sympathise has 3 syllables: sym-pa-thise. The stress falls on "sym".

What is another word for sympathise?

Close synonyms include sympathize, commiserate, sympathize, sympathize, empathize. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

Is sympathise a common word?

sympathise is banded "Uncommon" — turns up in careful writing rather than conversation. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.