mobile

From Middle English, from Old French, from Latin mōbilis (“easy to be moved, moveable”), from moveō (“move”).

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈməʊbaɪl/

  • Audio (UK):

    (file)

• (US) IPA^(key): /ˈmoʊbəl/, /ˈmoʊbil/, /ˈmoʊbaɪl/, sculpture always IPA^(key): /ˈmoʊbil/

mobile (comparative more mobile, superlative most mobile)

1. Capable of being moved, especially on wheels.

   Synonyms: movable; see also Thesaurus:in motion, Thesaurus:movable

   Antonyms: fixed, immobile, immovable, sessile, stationary

   a mobile home

2. Pertaining to or by agency of mobile phones.

   mobile number

   mobile internet

   • 2012 December 1, “An internet of airborne things”, in The Economist‎^[1], volume 405, number 8813, page 3 (Technology Quarterly):

     A farmer could place an order for a new tractor part by text message and pay for it by mobile money-transfer. A supplier many miles away would then take the part to the local matternet station for airborne dispatch via drone.

3. Characterized by an extreme degree of fluidity; moving or flowing with great freedom.

   Synonyms: fluxive; see also Thesaurus:runny

   Mercury is a mobile liquid.

4. Easily moved in feeling, purpose, or direction; excitable; changeable; fickle.

   Synonyms: excitable, fickle; see also Thesaurus:changeable

   • 1850, Nathaniel Hawthorne, chapter 7, in The Scarlet Letter, a Romance, Boston, Mass.: Ticknor, Reed, and Fields, →OCLC:

     the quick and mobile curiosity of her disposition

5. Changing in appearance and expression under the influence of the mind.

   mobile features

   • 1837, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], “Another London Life”, in Ethel Churchill: Or, The Two Brides. […], volume I, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, page 176:

     His finely cut features were capable of every variety of expression; they were, to use a French epithet, expressive as their epithets for all social qualities usually are, mobile in the extreme.

6. (biology) Capable of being moved, aroused, or excited; capable of spontaneous movement.

   Synonym: motile

   Antonym: sessile

mobile (plural mobiles)

2. (sculpture) A kinetic sculpture or decorative arrangement made of items hanging so that they can move independently from each other.
4. (telephony, UK, Ireland) Ellipsis of mobile phone.

   Synonym: cell phone

   • 2000, “Idioteque”, in Kid A, performed by Radiohead:

     Mobiles squerking, mobiles chirping / Take the money and run

6. (uncountable, Internet) The internet accessed via mobile devices.

   there are many business opportunities in mobile

7. One who moves or can move (e.g. to travel).
   • 1963, Highway Research Record:

     […] if the constrained "immobiles" are given the same transportation access as the unconstrained "mobiles". […] We concentrated on a mobile teenager population that had good public transportation or automobile access and a […]

   • 1988 February 25, Nigel Nicholson, Michael West, Managerial Job Change: Men and Women in Transition, Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 132:

     Table 6.5 does indeed show that non-changers were more contented […] For Table 6.7 shows that even when we take account of the initial differences between the mobiles and immobiles, the mobiles' ratings of job characteristics move strongly in a positive direction while all the immobiles' record negative shifts. So the pattern is clear and consistent: jobs get better for movers and worse for non-movers.

   • 2005 July 19, Ian M. Philpott, The Royal Air Force: The Trenchard Years, 1918–1929, Casemate Publishers, →ISBN:

     One ex-airwoman recalls meal times for both 'mobiles' and 'immobiles', when they sat on backless benches at long bare tables. The 'immobiles' brought in their own food, crockery and cutlery. A free-standing iron range was used […]

8. (video games) Synonym of mob (“non-player character”)

• mobile-first

• → Japanese: モバイル (mobairu)
• → Kurtöp: མོ་བའིལ (mobail)
• → Persian: موبایل (mobâil)

• “mobile”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• “mobile”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., 1911, →OCLC.
• “mobile”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
• mobile on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• mobile phone on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• mobile (sculpture) on Wikipedia.Wikipedia

• bemoil, emboil, emboli

mobile

1. definite of mobil
2. plural of mobil

< English mobile

• IPA^(key): /ˈmobile/, [ˈmo̞bile̞] (nalle-type declension)
• IPA^(key): /ˈmobileˣ/, [ˈmo̞bile̞(ʔ)] (hame-type declension)
• Rhymes: -obile
• Hyphenation^(key): mo‧bi‧le

mobile

1. mobile (kinetic sculpture)

• “mobile”, in Kielitoimiston sanakirja [Dictionary of Contemporary Finnish]‎^[2] (in Finnish) (online dictionary, continuously updated), Kotimaisten kielten keskuksen verkkojulkaisuja 35, Helsinki: Kotimaisten kielten tutkimuskeskus (Institute for the Languages of Finland), 2004–, retrieved 2023-07-03

Learned borrowing from Latin mōbilis. Doublet of meuble.

• IPA^(key): /mɔ.bil/

• Audio:

  (file)

mobile (plural mobiles)

1. mobile
2. moving
3. movable

• immobile

• → Turkish: mobil

mobile m (plural mobiles)

1. (physics) moving body
2. mobile (decoration)
3. motive (for an action, for a crime)
4. mobile phone; Ellipsis of téléphone mobile.

   Synonyms: cell, téléphone cellulaire, cellulaire, téléphone mobile, téléphone portable, portable

• “mobile”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

• Audio:

  (file)

mobile

1. inflection of mobil:
   1. strong/mixed nominative/accusative feminine singular
   2. strong nominative/accusative plural
   3. weak nominative all-gender singular
   4. weak accusative feminine/neuter singular

Probably borrowed from Latin mōbilis.

• IPA^(key): /ˈmɔ.bi.le/

• Audio:

  (file)

• Rhymes: -ɔbile
• Hyphenation: mò‧bi‧le

mobile (plural mobili, superlative mobilissimo)

1. movable, mobile

   Antonym: immobile

2. moving

• mobilmente

mobile m (plural mobili)

1. (in the singular) piece of furniture (item of furniture)
2. (in the plural) furniture

   Synonyms: mobilia, mobilio, arredamento

3. (heraldry) charge
4. mobile (cellular phone)

   Synonyms: cellulare, telefonino

   Antonym: fisso

• mobile in Collins Italian-English Dictionary
• mobile in Luciano Canepari, Dizionario di Pronuncia Italiana (DiPI)
• mobile in garzantilinguistica.it – Garzanti Linguistica, De Agostini Scuola Spa
• mòbile¹ in Dizionario Italiano Olivetti, Olivetti Media Communication

• emboli

• (Classical Latin) IPA^(key): /ˈmoː.bi.le/, [ˈmoːbɪɫ̪ɛ]
• (modern Italianate Ecclesiastical) IPA^(key): /ˈmo.bi.le/, [ˈmɔːbile]

mōbile

1. nominative/accusative/vocative neuter singular of mōbilis

• mobile in Charles du Fresne du Cange’s Glossarium Mediæ et Infimæ Latinitatis (augmented edition with additions by D. P. Carpenterius, Adelungius and others, edited by Léopold Favre, 1883–1887)

mobile

1. definite singular of mobil
2. plural of mobil

mobile

1. definite singular of mobil
2. plural of mobil

mobile

1. inflection of mobilar:
   1. first/third-person singular present subjunctive
   2. third-person singular imperative

mobile

1. plural of mobilă

mobile

1. definite natural masculine singular of mobil