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implicit

adjective

im·plic·itim-ˈpli-sət How to pronounce implicit (audio)

:capable of being understood from something else though unexpressed:implied

animplicit assumption

Still another problem for Middle America was how corporations … were allowed to breach theimplicit social contract of the postwar era.—

Kevin Phillips

compareexplicitsense 1a

:present but not consciously held or recognized

implicit attitudes

implicit racism

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Implicit With a Preposition

Implicit is often followed by a preposition, and that preposition is usuallyin:

"American Horror Story" is a pretty grisly show. No one should be too surprised by that revelation — it’s sort of the promise implicit in its name, after all.
—Lacy Baugher,The Baltimore Sun, 3 Nov. 2016

On less frequent occasions,implicit may be followed byfrom,with, orwithin:

[S]uch a ruling seemed implicit from Fullam’s comments.
—Sean O’Sullivan,The News Journal (Wilmington, DE), 4 October 2006
Implicit with the discovery of oil was the hard truth that it wasn't going to last forever.
—Warren Jones et al.,Alaska Dispatch News, 1 June 2016
Russia's president was explicit, calling on the West to pressure Kiev to deliver results. Implicit within that was a threat: that Moscow will not play along with the talks forever.
—Sarah Rainsford,BBC News, 14 Aug. 2016
The black dead ocean looked like a mirror of the night; it was cold, implicit with dread and death…
—Norman Mailer,The Naked and the Dead, 1948

Synonyms

See All Synonyms & Antonyms in Thesaurus

Examples ofimplicit in a Sentence

This assumption,implicit in innumerable statements by President Reagan … dictates most of our current political and military programs.—

Henry Steele Commager,Atlantic,March 1982

… in the best stories the end isimplicit from the beginning.—

Joan Aiken,The Writer,May 1968

The goodness and strengthimplicit within Pen unfold but slowly.—

John DeBruyn,LIT,Spring 1966

The movies borrowed from other arts on the way to finding methodsimplicit in their medium.—

Bernard DeVoto,The World of Fiction,1950

There is a sense of moral dutyimplicit in her writings. I haveimplicit trust in her honesty.

Recent Examples on the Web

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage.Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors.Send us feedback.

But alsoimplicitin this genre of social media content, some critics and observers say, are more insidious messages — ones that distort our perceptions of masculinity.—

Harmeet Kaur,CNN Money, 29 Mar. 2025This executive order made manifest theimplicitmessage of the first two: that Trump intends to deter large law firms from pursuing the pro-bono cases against Administration policies that plagued him during his first term and that threaten to do so in his second.—

Ruth Marcus,New Yorker, 27 Mar. 2025In addition to the anti-utility bias, the gas companies contend isimplicitin the op-ed and related text message exchange, the companies are arguing in court that the rate decisions should be invalidated because of procedural errors by PURA over the year-long inquiry that ended in the rate cuts.—

Edmund H. Mahony,Hartford Courant, 26 Mar. 2025As more and more of these videos appeared, a backlash built from users concerned about animplicitbody-shaming message.—

Issy Ronald,CNN, 24 Mar. 2025See All Example Sentences forimplicit

Word History

Etymology

borrowed from French & Medieval Latin; Frenchimplicite, going back to Middle French, "complicated, tangled," borrowed from Medieval Latinimplicitus "involved, complicated, implied," going back to Latin, "involved, intricate," variant past participle ofimplicāre "to fold about itself, entwine, involve" — more atimplicate

Note: The Latin verbimplicāre has, along with other derivatives of-plicāre, two possible past participles; see note atexplicit.

First Known Use

1613, in the meaning defined atsense 1a

Time Traveler

The first known use ofimplicit was in 1613

See more words from the same year