Intermittent

//ˌɪntɚˈmɪtn̩t// adj, noun

adj, noun ·Moderate ·High school level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    An intermittent fever or disease. dated

    "Feuers, and especially those that are called intermittents, discontinuing agues, euen naturally at the beginning and their first inuasion, cause vomits: and at the declining, sweats."

Adjective
  1. 1
    Stopping and starting, occurring, or presenting at intervals; coming after a particular time span.

    "The day was cloudy with intermittent rain."

  2. 2
    Existing only for certain seasons; that is, being dry for part of the year. specifically

    "The area has many intermittent lakes and streams."

Adjective
  1. 1
    stopping and starting at irregular intervals wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms
sporadicalternatealternatingarrestedbeatingbroken

Example

More examples

"Intermittent flashes of lightning illuminated the dark gloom of the forest."

Etymology

From Middle French intermittent, from Latin intermittens (“sending between”), from prefix inter- (“among, on”) + mittens (“sending”), from mittere (“to send”).

Related phrases

Charcot intermittent feverCharcot's intermittent feverintermittent explosive disorderintermittent fastingintermittent lake

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.