DictionaryAI

extant

adjective
EK-stuhnt/ˈɛk.stənt/UKek-STANT/ɛkˈstænt/

2 meanings of extant

Practice

  1. 1
    not lostadjective
    Still in existence; surviving, rather than having been lost, destroyed or died out.

    Only two extant copies of the first edition are known to collectors.

    Several of the station's original buildings are still extant beside the old line.

    UsageFrequently after still or after its noun, as in copies still extant; surviving is the everyday alternative.

    Similarexisting, remaining

    Oppositeextinct, lost, destroyed

    Note

    The Latin verb behind it, extō, meant both "stand out" and "exist", and English, using the word since 1545, has kept mostly the second. It is the word for what has survived where much was lost: extant manuscripts, the only extant copies, extant species (the opposite of extinct ones).

    Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 2 facts

  2. 2
    adjectiveobsolete
    Standing out from a surface, or rising above what surrounds it.
    Note

    Here the Latin parts are in plain view: ex-, "out", and stō, "stand", so that a thing extant stood out above a surface. Robert Boyle used it of ice floating so low that scarcely any part was "evidently extant" above the water. The sense is obsolete; in Boyle's line, read it as "projecting", not as "surviving", which is the meaning that won.

    Checked 30 Oct 2026 · 5 facts

    • The Latin components are ex-, meaning out, and stō, meaning stand. en.wiktionary.org
    • Extant formerly meant projecting above a surface. en.wiktionary.org
    • Robert Boyle used evidently extant for the portion of floating ice projecting above water. en.wiktionary.org
    • The projecting sense is obsolete. en.wiktionary.org
    • The meaning depends on context. Older scientific writing also uses extant to mean existing: Hooke's Micrographia refers to an existing hypothesis as a Hypothesis extant. gutenberg.org

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Origin

Latin extō ("to stand out, exist"), built from ex- ("out") and stō ("stand"), had the present participle extāns, which entered English, with the first record in 1545.

Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 5 facts