navigate

English

Etymology

From Middle English navigate, from Latin nāvigō, from nāvis (“ship”) + agō (“do”), from Proto-Indo-European *néh₂us (“boat”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /ˈnæv.ɪ.ɡeɪt/
• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈnæv.ɪ.ɡeɪt/, enPR: năv′-ĭ-gāt

• Audio (US)

  (file)

Verb

navigate (third-person singular simple present navigates, present participle navigating, simple past and past participle navigated)

1. (transitive) To plan, control and record the position and course of a vehicle, ship, aircraft, etc., on a journey; to follow a planned course.

   He navigated the bomber to the Ruhr.

2. (intransitive) To give directions, as from a map, to someone driving a vehicle.

   You drive. I'll navigate.

3. (intransitive) To travel over water in a ship; to sail.

   We navigated to France in the dinghy.

4. (transitive, computing) To move between web pages, menus, etc. by means of hyperlinks, mouse clicks, or any other mechanism.

   It was difficult to navigate back to the home page.

5. (transitive, figurative) To find a way through a difficult situation or process.
   • 2019, Li Huang, James Lambert, “Another Arrow for the Quiver: A New Methodology for Multilingual Researchers”, in Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, →DOI, page 11:

     However, given current sensibilities about individual privacy and data protection, the recording of oral data is becoming increasingly onerous for researchers who are obliged to navigate an often time-consuming and complex series of administrative requirements and corollary review processes in order to be granted ethics clearance.

   • 2020 July 29, Paul Stephen, “A new collaboration centred on New Street”, in Rail, page 54:

     Complaints have risen in particular from passengers changing trains, who have observed little or no improvement in their ability to navigate between the station's 13 platforms.

Hyponyms

• circumnavigate

Derived terms

• navigation
• navigator
• navigable

Related terms

• naval
• navy

Translations

Further reading

• “navigate”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• “navigate”, in The Century Dictionary , New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
• “navigate”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.

Anagrams

• vaginate

Esperanto

Adverb

navigate

1. present adverbial passive participle of navigi

Italian

Etymology 1

Verb

navigate

1. inflection of navigare:
   1. second-person plural present indicative
   2. second-person plural imperative

Etymology 2

Participle

navigate f pl

1. feminine plural of navigato

Anagrams

• agentiva, negativa, vengiata

Latin

Verb

nāvigāte

1. second-person plural present active imperative of nāvigō

Participle

nāvigāte

1. vocative masculine singular of nāvigātus