adj ·Uncommon ·Advanced level

Definitions

Adjective

1. 1
   Of or relating to polyphony.

   "a polyphonic ringtone"

2. 2
   Having two or more independent but harmonic melodies.

   "Near-synonym: contrapuntal"

3. 3
   Able to play more than one musical note at the same time.
4. 4
   Capable of being read in more than one way.

Adjective

1. 1
   having two or more independent but harmonically related melodic parts sounding together wordnet
2. 2
   of or relating to or characterized by polyphony wordnet
3. 3
   having two or more phonetic values wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms

contrapuntalcontrapuntalharmoniouspolyphonouspolyphonous

Antonyms

All antonyms

homophonicmonophonic

Example

More examples

"This music is highly polyphonic."

Etymology

Originally from Ancient Greek πολύφωνος (polúphōnos) + -ic. In later use from poly- + -phonic.

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