acronym

American  

[ak-ruh-nim] / ˈæk rə nɪm /

noun

• acronyms
  plural

1. a word formed from the initial letters or groups of letters of words in a set phrase or series of words and pronounced as a separate word, as Wac from Women's Army Corps, OPEC from Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries, or loran from long-range navigation.

2. initialism.

3. an acrostic.

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verb (used with object)

1. to make an acronym of.

   The committee's name has been acronymed MIKE.

acronym British  

/ ˈækrənɪm, əˈkrɒnɪməs /

noun

1. a pronounceable name made up of a series of initial letters or parts of words; for example, UNESCO for the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization

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acronym Cultural  

1. A word formed by combining the beginning letters of a name or phrase, as in WASP for w hite A nglo-S axon P rotestant, or by combining the initial syllables of a series of words, as in radar, which stands for ra dio de tecting a nd r anging.

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Grammar

See abbreviation.

Usage

What does acronym mean? An acronym is a word formed by abbreviating a phrase by combining certain letters of words in the phrase (often the first initial of each) into a single term. Common examples of acronyms include NASA (an acronym for National Aeronautics and Space Administration) and FOMO (a slang acronym for fear of missing out). The word scuba comes from an acronym for self-contained underwater breathing apparatus. Although acronym is sometimes used generally to refer to any term formed from this kind of abbreviation, it typically refers to ones that can be pronounced as a word. This is sometimes contrasted with an initialism. What’s the difference between an acronym and an initialism?Initialism is sometimes used as a synonym for acronym, but most technically it refers to an abbreviation in which each initial is pronounced separately (instead of pronouncing them together as a single word, as in scuba or NASA). For example, FBI is an initialism of Federal Bureau of Investigation; TMI is an initialism of too much information. Acronyms are often associated with their use in certain fields that use a lot of technical terms, like science, tech, and the military. But they’re popular in all kinds of contexts since they’re an easy way to make long phrases much shorter. Example: STEM is an acronym that stands for “Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics.”

Discover More

Acronyms are often less clumsy than the complete expressions they represent and are easier to write and remember.

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• acronymic
  adjective
• acronymic;
  adjective
• acronymous
  adjective
• acronymically
  adverb

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• acronyms
  plural

Etymology

Origin of acronym

First recorded in 1940–45; acr- + -onym

Explanation

Are the members of your skydiving club tripping over the name Student Parachuting League & Aerial Team? Why not use each word's first letter to make an acronym, and call the club SPLAT? There, that’s better. What do NASA, sonar, and scuba have in common? They are all acronyms. Not only does each letter come from the first letter of another word, but each group of letters is easy to pronounce as its own word. Though its roots are classical (acro means "tip" and nym means "name"), acronym is fairly new as English words go: it's been around since the early 1940s.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

acronym acronyms

“The product that would motivate someone to move from ICE to an EV hasn’t existed until R2,” Scaringe said, referring to an acronym for cars with internal combustion engines.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 30, 2026

The US military said this was "a strong response to over 30 IRGC-directed aerial drone attacks in the last 72 hours", using an acronym for Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

From BBC ● Jul. 29, 2026

Wall Street has a new way to market the AI trade: Take the shares of companies that investors most want to own, including some they still cannot buy, and turn them into an acronym.

From MarketWatch ● Jun. 16, 2026

On Tuesday, China's state-run Xinhua news agency reported Xi as saying he had reached "an important consensus with Kim on developing China-DPRK relations in the new era", using North Korea's official acronym.

From Barron's ● Jun. 10, 2026

They call it Radar now, an American word, an acronym of RAdio Detection And Ranging, which I do not think is easier to remember.

From "Code Name Verity" by Elizabeth Wein

When Megg Gawat, a 32-year-old software engineer, got the results of his blood work last year, he was confused by some of the medical jargon and acronyms.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 6, 2026

Known by acronyms that need no explanation, viruses like Covid, Sars and Ebola conjure up images of medics in protective suits and spark fear in populations worldwide.

From Barron's ● Jun. 25, 2026

And we all know some of the many acronyms for that.

From MarketWatch ● Apr. 23, 2026

In one scene, a civilian asks Lieutenant Dane what the acronyms tattooed on both his hands stand for.

From Salon ● Jan. 25, 2026

Some acronyms prove so catchy that they become words in their own right.

From "The Unseen Guest" by Maryrose Wood