EN

Synonyms for dismiss

29 synonyms
19 antonyms
1 meaning

verb

Most common

ignore fire reject send away

All synonyms

Verb

1. Ignore

ignore, fire, reject, send away, discard, sack, displace, push aside, let go, disregard, can US, abandon, eject, remove, give notice, waive, brush aside, send, depose, discharge, expel, banish

Other

drop, throw out, acquit, dispel, dissolve, bounce, ship out

Antonyms

hire, employ, engage

All antonyms of dismiss →

Definitions

v. 1
To discharge; to end the employment or service of.
The company dismissed me after less than a year.

Related words

Word family: dismissal dismissive dismission

Forms

Past participle: dismissed
e.g. dismissed → ignored, fired, rejected, discarded…

Choose the right word

Dismiss, Despatch or Send?

To despatch is to send hastily or very promptly, ordinarily with a destination in view; to dismiss is to send away from oneself without reference to a destination; as, to dismiss a clerk, an application, or an annoying subject.

J. C. Fernald, English Synonyms and Antonyms (1914)

Example sentences

ignore If you ignore the past, you jeopardize the future.
reject Voters may yet reject the misbegotten 'Dream Act'.
discard We can't discard the possibility of an accident.

Popularity over time

Word	1850 → 2019	Trend
dismiss		steady
ignore		rising
reject		steady
discard		rising

Use in printed books, per decade from 1850 to 2019.

By length

3 letters: can¹
4 letters: fire², send¹, drop¹, sack¹
5 letters: expel², waive¹, eject²
6 letters: remove², ignore², reject², bounce¹, banish², dispel², depose², acquit²
7 letters: abandon³, discard²
8 letters: dissolve², displace²
9 letters: discharge², disregard³

The small number after each word is its number of syllables (fire² = 2 syllables).

In other languages

Français: limoger
Italiano: silurare
Español: destituir
Deutsch: hinauswerfen
Català: destituir