identify
Frequently Asked Questions
- recognize—to be able to tell what something is (and often to know its name), as in He immediately identified/recognized it as a monarch butterfly.
- diagnose or pinpoint, as in My mechanic was finally able to identify/diagnose/pinpoint the problem.
- associate, such as with a certain group or belief, as in She’s known for identifying/associating with the party’s reform wing.
- distinguish, as in Her height identified/distinguished her as the volleyball player.
- establish (who someone is), as in He has been identified/established as the main suspect. Relatedly, to identify someone is to figure out who they are—to establish their identity.
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
It was fragments from the pistol butt which enabled police to identify it as a Luger P06.
From BBC ● Sep. 1, 2026
The brush head features a tiny camera that analyzes 28 live images a second to identify gaps in the teeth, triggering a conical burst of mouthrinse that flosses in between.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 1, 2026
Perhaps you shouldn’t expect to appeal to people’s sense of pride and nostalgia if they don’t recognize the place or product, if they no longer identify with it.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 1, 2026
For those families, the priority should be to build whatever financial breathing room their circumstances allow and identify workplace or caregiving arrangements that could ease some of the pressure.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 31, 2026
Maggie can only identify half of their meals—tamales and burgers are easy, but there are also bowls filled with rice and what might be stew with cornbread.
From "Legendary Frybread Drive-In" by Cynthia Leitich Smith
Bhagwat’s U.S. appearance aims to capitalize on Modi’s political ascension and popularity among the Indian diaspora, including the fast-growing, nearly 4.8 million population of Americans whom the Census Bureau identifies as ethnic Indian.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 28, 2026
Mr. Lieberman identifies ultraprocessed foods as the principal drivers of what he calls the “obesity pandemic” and avoiding them should be central to our dietary strategy.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 26, 2026
Another trope Hartnett identifies in asset allocation is “Anything But China.”
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 14, 2026
Manivannan, who identifies as non-binary and uses they/them pronouns, was being interviewed about care and carers in society, when host Sindhu Rajasekaran raised the rehabilitation of criminals, saying she could have no empathy for rapists.
From BBC ● Aug. 10, 2026
She does not reply but her eyes light up when he identifies himself as the person responsible for its construction.
From "The Night Circus" by Erin Morgenstern
The Act requires firms which have identified illegal content, including fraudulent material, on their sites to show they are committed to removing it.
From BBC ● Sep. 2, 2026
“Detectives identified the gangs, motive and suspects early but failed to aggressively pursue those suspects and develop reluctant witnesses.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 1, 2026
Only a handful of the more than 1,000 bodies recovered by authorities so far have been identified, stretching Nepal's already limited morgue capacity.
From Barron's ● Sep. 1, 2026
Researchers also identified differences among racial and ethnic groups, with black participants facing a 75% higher risk than Asian participants.
From Science Daily ● Sep. 1, 2026
It should immediately be apparent that in a culture in which experience was taking on a new significance, the term ‘fact’ was invaluable because it identified that type of knowledge which is grounded in experience.
From "The Invention of Science" by David Wootton
Suno’s platform uses a “distillation of the identifying attributes of the human beings who made the songs and recordings: the qualities that make a listener say ‘that is Jason Isbell.’”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 1, 2026
Under the proposed system, state election authorities would upload lists of mail voters and identifying barcodes to a new federal portal.
From Barron's ● Sep. 1, 2026
"Our dream would be to go far beyond simply identifying the Dahshur royals," said Hashesh.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 30, 2026
He asked for help identifying them in order to report them to the police.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 30, 2026
Just inside, a note identifying the publisher as R. L. Polk & Co, the name everyone uses when they talk about the compendium of businesses and people.
From "The Brightwood Code" by Monica Hesse
Vocabulary lists containing identify
Tier 2 Words for the SBAC ELA Items
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PARCC: Language of the Test (Grade7)
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Jim Burke's Academic Vocabulary List
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