fixative
noun, adjective
fixative is a noun meaning “A substance that fixes, protects, or preserves” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled F-I-X-A-T-I-V-E and has 3 syllables, and it appears about once in every 13 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data). The plural of fixative is fixatives.
What does fixative mean?
noun
- 1
A substance that fixes, protects, or preserves.
- 2
The components of a perfume that prolong or bolster the notes, and may or may not be the base note itself.
adjective
- 1
Serving to fix or bind.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you pronounce fixative?
- US
Fixative has 3 syllables (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Flame,_not_lame-fixative.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of fixative
- fixatives plural
- more fixative comparative
- most fixative superlative
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How common is fixative?
Fixative appears about once in every 13 million words in written English, the 106,501st most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).