surrogate

American  

[sur-uh-geyt, -git, suhr-, sur-uh-geyt, suhr-] / ˈsɜr əˌgeɪt, -gɪt, ˈsʌr-, ˈsɜr əˌgeɪt, ˈsʌr- /

noun

1. a person appointed to act for another; deputy.

2. (in some states) a judicial officer having jurisdiction over the probate of wills, the administration of estates, etc.

3. the deputy of an ecclesiastical judge, especially of a bishop or a bishop's chancellor.

4. a substitute.

5. a surrogate mother.

6. Politics. someone who acts on behalf of a politician or political candidate by making public appearances, issuing statements, etc., when that person is engaged elsewhere or when that person’s image would be bolstered by certain affiliations.

   His camp won the “prestige of science” battle by signing on high-profile physicists, chemists, and biologists as campaign surrogates.

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adjective

1. regarded or acting as a surrogate.

   a surrogate father.

2. involving or indicating the use of a surrogate mother to conceive or carry an embryo.

   surrogate parenting.

verb (used with object)

surrogated, surrogating

1. to put into the place of another as a successor, substitute, or deputy; substitute for another.

2. to subrogate.

surrogate British  

noun

1. a person or thing acting as a substitute

2. a deputy, such as a clergyman appointed to deputize for a bishop in granting marriage licences

3. psychiatry a person who is a substitute for someone else, esp in childhood when different persons, such as a brother or teacher, can act as substitutes for the parents

4. (in some US states) a judge with jurisdiction over the probate of wills, etc

5. (modifier) of, relating to, or acting as a surrogate

   a surrogate pleasure

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verb

1. to put in another's position as a deputy, substitute, etc

2. to appoint as a successor to oneself

Other Word Forms

• surrogateship noun
• surrogation noun

Etymology

Origin of surrogate

First recorded in 1525–35; from Latin surrogātus, variant of subrogātus “nominated as a substitiute”; subrogate

Explanation

Someone who acts as a surrogate takes the place of another person. If a celebrity leaves her seat to use the restroom in the middle of a big Hollywood awards ceremony, a surrogate will take her place until she returns. Surrogate comes from the Latin word surrogare, which means "to put in another's place," or "to substitute." An uncle might refer to his niece as a surrogate child if they are very close, especially if he doesn't have his own biological children. Since 1978, surrogate has also been used to describe a woman who carries and delivers a baby for another person or couple.

Example Sentences

After meeting prospective surrogate Annie Peverelle at an earlier Surrogacy UK event, they got to know each other and Peverelle offered to carry the couple's baby for them.

From BBC • Mar. 31, 2026

She described a “hesitation to apply regulatory flexibility through surrogate endpoints, natural history studies and external controls.”

From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 7, 2026

So being a single father by choice is a rarer phenomenon, and doing so via gestational surrogacy, in which the surrogate mother bears no genetic link to the child she carries, is rarer yet.

From Slate • Feb. 23, 2026

But the joy that little monkey feels for his orangutan, which he uses as shield, surrogate and playmate, is both heartbreaking and heartwarming.

From Los Angeles Times • Feb. 20, 2026

It was a wind that offered no relief from the heat, but it caught Lillian’s hair and pushed it softly back, an auburn shining pennant, a surrogate windsock, revealing a long, elegant neck.

From "The Great Santini" by Pat Conroy

Related Words

• proxy
• stand-in