intermediate

UK/ɪn.tə(ɹ)ˈmi.di.ət/US/ɪn.tə(ɹ)ˈmi.di.ət/

adjectiveC1Occasional — familiar, but not everyday · #10,908 of 15,258mostly written

Intermediate means coming between two stages or levels. An intermediate level, an intermediate step, intermediate students.

In language learning it is the long middle where progress stops feeling like progress, and more people give up there than anywhere else. In chemistry an intermediate is a compound formed and consumed part-way through a reaction.

Definitions of intermediate

1adjectiveintermediateComing between two stages or levels.C1
“The ski resort has slopes for beginners, intermediate skiers and experts.”

intermediate is a level.

Where it comes from

Medieval Latin intermediatus comes from intermedius — inter, between, plus medius, middle.

Medieval Latin
intermediātus
English, today
intermediate

Medieval Latin intermediātus, perfect passive participle of intermediō (see -ate), further from intermedius + -ō.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practise this word

intermediate in the wild

An appellate court other than a supreme court is sometimes referred to as an intermediate appellate court.
Appellate court
The concept arose soon after Gautama Buddha's death, with a number of earlier Buddhist schools accepting the existence of such an intermediate state, while other schools rejected it.
Bardo
Used without qualification, "bardo" is the state of existence intermediate between two lives on earth.
Bardo
Clubs attain intermediate status by fulfilling certain criteria (e.g. owning or leasing its own enclosed ground).
Northern Ireland football league system
National leagues exist at senior and intermediate level.
Northern Ireland football league system

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From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

From Project Gutenberg, public domain. These sentences are from real books, shown to illustrate the word at work.

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