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undulate

/ˈʌndjəleɪt/verb, adjective

undulate is a verb meaning “To cause to move in a wavelike motion” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled U-N-D-U-L-A-T-E and has 3 syllables, and it appears about once in every 15 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data).

What does undulate mean?

verb

  1. 1

    To cause to move in a wavelike motion.

  2. 2

    To cause to resemble a wave.

  3. 3

    To move in wavelike motions.

    His tongue undulated.

  4. 4

    To appear wavelike.

adjective

  1. 1

    Wavy in appearance or form.

  2. 2

    Changing the pitch and volume of one's voice.

  3. 3

    sinuous, winding up and down.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How do you pronounce undulate?

  • /ˈʌndjəleɪt/
  • /ˈʌndjʊleɪt/
  • /ˈʌnd͡ʒəleɪt/

As an adjective (“Wavy in appearance or form”): /ˈʌndjəlɪt/, /ˈʌndjʊlɪt/, /ˈʌnd͡ʒəlɪt/.

Undulate 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)-Vealhurl-undulate.wav, LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-undulate2.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Forms of undulate

  • undulates present, singular, he/she/it
  • undulating participle, present
  • undulated participle, past
  • more undulate comparative
  • most undulate superlative

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How common is undulate?

Undulate appears about once in every 15 million words in written English, the 115,751st 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).

Undulate in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Germanwogen, schwingen, wellenförmig bewegen (transitive: cause to move in a wave), wellen, ondulieren (transitive: cause to resemble a wave)
Portugueseondular, ondear (transitive: cause to move in a wave), ondulado (wavy in appearance or form)
Spanishondear (transitive: cause to move in a wave), ondulado (wavy in appearance or form), ondular (intransitive: move in wavelike motions)
Frenchonduler, ondoyer (intransitive: move in wavelike motions)

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.

Where does undulate come from?

First attested in 1664; borrowed from New Latin undulātus, the perfect passive participle of undulō (see -ate (verb-forming suffix)), from an unattested *undula (“small wave”), diminutive of Latin unda (“wave”).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).