emigrate

English

A narrative painting depicting a middle-class family emigrating by boat from Victorian England to start a new life in Australia.

Etymology

From Latin emigratus, perfect passive participle of emigro (“to move away, remove, depart from a place”), from ex- (“out of, from”) + migro (“to move, remove, depart”).

Pronunciation

• enPR: ĕʹmĭ.grāt'
• (Received Pronunciation, General American) IPA^(key): /ˈɛmɪɡɹeɪt/
• (pin–pen merger) IPA^(key): /ˈɪmɪɡɹeɪt/
• Homophone: immigrate (pin–pen merger)
• Hyphenation: em‧i‧grate

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

Verb

emigrate (third-person singular simple present emigrates, present participle emigrating, simple past and past participle emigrated)

1. (intransitive) To leave the country in which one lives, especially one's native country, in order to reside elsewhere.

   Antonym: immigrate

   • 1856 February, [Thomas Babington] Macaulay, “Oliver Goldsmith”, in T[homas] F[lower] E[llis], editor, The Miscellaneous Writings and Speeches of Lord Macaulay, new edition, London: Longman, Green, Reader, & Dyer, published 1871, →OCLC:

     Forced to emigrate in a body to America.

   • 1872, John Henry Newman, Historical Sketches:

     They [the Huns] were emigrating from Tartary into Europe in the time of the Goths.

   • 2025 November 13, Kamala Thiagarajan, “If you're going to be kind to another human, today is the day to do it!”, in National Public Radio‎^[1], Washington, D.C.: National Public Radio, archived from the original on 28 August 2026:

     Her family was planning to emigrate to the U.S. from Zaire (now the Democratic Republic of Congo) and couldn't afford school fees.

Usage notes

• In both formal and everyday usage, the distinction between immigrate and emigrate reflects directionality: one immigrates to a destination country and emigrates from a country of origin.

Derived terms

• emigrator
• unemigrating

Related terms

• emigrant
• emigration
• émigré
• immigrant
• immigrate
• immigration
• migrate
• migration
• migratory

Translations

to leave one's country in order to reside elsewhere

• Albanian: emigroj (sq), mërgoj (sq)
• Armenian: արտագաղթել (artagaġtʻel)
• Catalan: emigrar (ca)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 移民 (zh) (yímín), 移居 (zh) (yíjū)

• Czech: emigrovat
• Danish: emigrere, udvandre
• Dutch: emigreren (nl)
• Esperanto: elmigri
• Finnish: muuttaa maasta, emigroitua (fi)
• French: émigrer (fr)
• German: auswandern (de), emigrieren (de)
• Greek: αποδημώ (el) (apodimó)
• Hindi: उत्प्रवास m (utpravās)
• Hungarian: emigrál (hu), kivándorol (hu)
• Ido: emigrar (io)
• Italian: emigrare (it)
• Japanese: 移住する (ja) (いじゅうする, ijū suru), 移民する (ja) (いみんする, imin suru)
• Lutuv: pe
• Māori: maunu
• Polish: emigrować (pl) impf
• Portuguese: emigrar (pt)
• Russian: эмигри́ровать (ru) impf or pf (emigrírovatʹ), переселя́ться (ru) impf (pereseljátʹsja), пересели́ться (ru) pf (pereselítʹsja)
• Spanish: emigrar (es)
• Swedish: emigrera (sv), utvandra (sv)
• Welsh: ymfudo (cy)

The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.

Translations to be checked

• Woiwurrung: ^{(please verify)} yean'i

Further reading

• “emigrate”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.
• William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin Eli Smith, editors (1895–1910), “emigrate”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.
• “emigrate”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.

Anagrams

• Meritage, graemite

Italian

Etymology 1

Adjective

emigrate f pl

1. feminine plural of emigrato

Participle

emigrate f pl

1. feminine plural of emigrato

Etymology 2

Noun

emigrate f

1. plural of emigrata

Etymology 3

Verb

emigrate

1. inflection of emigrare:
   1. second-person plural present indicative
   2. second-person plural imperative

Anagrams

• gremiate, megateri, mergiate, regimate, remigate

Latin

Verb

ēmigrāte

1. second-person plural present active imperative of ēmigrō

Spanish

Verb

emigrate

1. second-person singular voseo imperative of emigrar combined with te