veteran

1. 1.

   rendered competent through trial and experience

   “a seasoned traveler”

   “veteran steadiness”

   “a veteran officer”

   Synonymsseasoned

   Similarexperienced

Other forms of veteran

plural

veterans·

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 veteran

What does veteran mean?

veteran means "a serviceman who has seen considerable active service". That is the primary sense; the word has 4 in total, listed in full on this page.

How many syllables are in veteran?

veteran has 3 syllables: vet-e-ran. The stress falls on "vet". In IPA it is /ˈvɛtɚən/.

What is another word for veteran?

Close synonyms include veteran soldier, vet, ex-serviceman, old-timer, oldtimer. 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 veteran a common word?

veteran is banded "Familiar" — widely understood, used when the subject calls for it. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.