Inset
adj, noun, verb ·Uncommon ·Advanced level
Definitions
- 1 A smaller thing set into a larger thing, such as a small picture inside a larger one.
"The inset of figure 1 shows the geometry of the samples."
- 2 a piece of material used to strengthen or enlarge a garment wordnet
- 3 Anything inserted.
- 4 an artifact that is inserted or is to be inserted wordnet
- 5 A small piece of material used to strengthen a garment.
Show 3 more definitions
- 6 a small picture inserted within the bounds or a larger one wordnet
- 7 A modular microphone that can be removed from a telephone handset without disassembly.
"Microphone insets can deteriorate and older examples may produce a permanent frying noise."
- 8 An opening partway down a shaft, giving access to the intermediate levels.
- 1 To set in; infix or implant. transitive
- 2 set or place in wordnet
- 3 To insert something. transitive
- 4 To add an inset to something. transitive
- 1 Having been inset.
"the inset diamonds"
Example
More examples"The hair on the instep of the foot of the stepfather of Father Pedro's mason is black. Whoever says the hair of the inset of the foot of the stepfather of Father Pedro's mason isn't black has blacker hair on the instep of the foot than the black hair of the instep of the foot of the stepfather of Father Pedro's mason."
Etymology
From Middle English insetten, from Old English insettan (“to set in, institute, appoint”), equivalent to in- + set. Cognate with Dutch inzetten (“to insert, set in”), Low German insetten (“to set in”), German einsetzen (“to insert, employ”), Danish indsætte (“to insert”), Swedish insätta (“to inset, induct, institute”), Icelandic innsetja (“to install”).
Related phrases
More for "inset"
Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.