noun ·Moderate ·College level

Definitions

Noun

1. 1
   Half of a school year (US) or academic year such as autumn or spring semester.

   "I will graduate at the end of the spring semester."

2. 2
   half a year; a period of 6 months wordnet
3. 3
   A period or term of six months.
4. 4
   one of two divisions of an academic year wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms

abundant yearacademic yearannumbissextile yearcalendar monthcalendar year

Example

More examples

"Because of Linda's outstanding grades last semester, I have arranged for her to visit Europe."

Etymology

From German Semester, from New Latin sēmestris (“lasting six months”), from sex (“six”) + mēnsis (“month”).

Related phrases

semester hourssemester schoolclass durationcollege dividercollege timegrading periodhalf yearschool halfschool termschool yeartime perioduniversity term

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