irrespective

UK/ɪɹɪˈspɛktɪv/US/ɪɹɪˈspɛktɪv/

adjectiveC1Very rare — outside the 30,000 commonest English words, so you will meet it in writing rather than in speech — respective sits at #9,112leans writtenformal · an editor’s judgement

Irrespective means it makes no difference — whatever the other thing may be, the result is the same. Everyone pays the same fare, irrespective of age.

The word almost never travels alone: irrespective of is the whole phrase, and dropping the of leaves the sentence unfinished. It is the formal twin of regardless of, and the two are interchangeable in meaning, with irrespective belonging to policies, contracts and official notices. There is a bonus in choosing it: irrespective avoids irregardless, which people reach for when they mix up the pair and which careful writing treats as a mistake.

Definitions of irrespective

1adjectiveirrespectiveNot affected by the thing mentioned, used with of.C1
“The rule applies to all staff irrespective of length of service.”
synonyms: regardless

Where it comes from

Latin
respectus
Medieval Latin
respectivus
English
respective
English, today
irrespective

From ir- + respective. respective Borrowed from Medieval Latin respectivus, from Latin respectus. by surface analysis, en + respect + ive.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in A Man Called Ove

First appears in chapter 34 of A Man Called Ove.

Practise this word

irrespective in the wild

For example, a retailer must pay rent and utility bills irrespective of sales.
Fixed cost
In contrast, cash basis accounting requires recognising an expense when the cash is paid, irrespective of when the expense was incurred.
Matching principle
The Senate was an attempt to guarantee a minimum level of representation to every part of Mauritania, irrespective of population.
Senate of Mauritania
Lead time bias happens when survival time appears longer because diagnosis was done earlier (for instance, by screening), irrespective of whether the patient lived longer.
Lead time bias
MPEG-4 DMIF supports the following functionalities: A transparent MPEG-4 DMIF-application interface irrespective of whether the peer is a remote interactive peer, broadcast or local storage media.
Delivery Multimedia Integration Framework

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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.

Related words

the respectus family

respect

irrespective — used too rare to measure · point at the bar for the others

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