Don't know what the word means? Just ask Cortana

As Microsoft and the Cortana team continue to refine the powerful AI and assistant, more features are slowly popping up online. A new one noticed by numerous people in our audience is definitions, powered by Oxford Dictionaries.

Load up Cortana and directly ask her 'What does _____ mean?' alternatively, 'What is the meaning of ____?' and the personal assistant from 500 years in the future pulls up a nice little card, complete with the word category and multiple definitions while exclaiming "I've found the meaning of…".

Additionally, there is on occasion a 'See more' link near the bottom, which then opens up the corresponding page on the Oxford site. Some definitions also come up under Bing's dictionary as well so your results may vary.

Although not a groundbreaking feature, using Cortana to ask quickly what a word means is certainly easier than hunting for that app, launching it, typing in a word and doing the lookup. This tool should also be particularly useful for those learning English as a second language, and we presume this word-lookup feature expands to other languages in the future.

Is looking up words a useful feature for you? How do you think Microsoft could make it better?

Thanks, Yahia M. and Aakash S., for the tips!

Daniel Rubino is the Editor-in-chief of Windows Central, head reviewer, podcast co-host, and analyst. He has been covering Microsoft since 2007 when this site was called WMExperts (and later Windows Phone Central). His interests include Windows, laptops, next-gen computing, and for some reason, watches. Before all this tech stuff, he worked on a Ph.D. in linguistics, watched people sleep (for medical purposes!), and ran the projectors at movie theaters because it was fun.

222 Comments

Offline too?
Does Cortana worth offline in general?
She can't even set reminder by voice when online. Why is it so is beyond me since all the tools are available on the phone.
Yup, pretty much. She can handle everything that is on the phone or in the app I guess. As it seems dictionary is not part of it
how will get info offline?
Red, damn it read. Otherwise, toggle your data off, and watch Cortana spin her wheels going nowhere fast (wouldn't two rows of predictive text be nice, sure would speed up typing, or swiping), unfortunately, bitch needs internet, even for simple shit like reminders just like @mikosoft said
As far as I know she can set reminders and di other stuff that are on the phone and she doesn't need to get days for them from the internet. Maybe your are doing something wrong?
Doubt it would work offline
How about inline?
Coratan requires internet and so it does require to fetch information from the web. For offline purpose, you may download dictionary.com app from windows phone store.
even location.
What location are you talking about ?
Where your mama is, lol
Can Cortana work offline?no..
So ans is no...
in fact it can (but it's limited) music, launching apps, call people, read messages + apps voice commands
Cortana can work offline. But if you are looking something that needs content from internet, it may not work. I switch off the internet on my phone every night and then enable quite hours to avoid unwanted calls at night and it works... hope you are aware quite hours will need cortana to be ON.
Ask Cortana to turn on airplane mode. And then ask her to turn it on again. Voila! It works much more offline than Siri does!
She certainly don't work offline in the UK, in fact she doesn't work at all unless you join the developer preview or pretend to be in the US. Come on MS, there are lots of users over here and it would be nice to show other phone users such a potentially good product. Bob
agreed. The UK release of Cortana, and 8.1.1 it taking soooo long on non dev phones. Crazy
Yeah, it does. All you say is open *name of your offline dictionary app* It's as simple as that.
It doesn't work offline :'( , just tried
Why would you even want to try that? :-/
On the line
Ok, it cant translate offline, got it. Thought that maybe it could, cause as some you mentioned she can do many different things offline
Dumb...
That's a dumb question, for Cortana to do everything offline it had to download all the internet data on the phone.
Who said everything? Now who is dumb, you see? Noone asked if Cortana does everything online. Just check OP. Meh.. those kids.. ;)
However I'm not the only who understood that. You better learn how to improve your question.
You do realize know matter how dumb others may appear in this comment section, you take the cake and the box it came in. Look that shit up offline
Cortana is bit available for my region yet. However I'm perfectly familiar with what she can do offline and online. Translation is a new feature so I asked for info. Still some think people that ask questions here in the comments section have no clue of windows phones and generally. Hire one of those dumb people for commenting.. Everyone will leave in a matter of days or hours! Lol
She told me she was absorbing the entire internet when I enabled her though! :P
Lol.. Yup, she actually told me that..
Haha hilarious! :D
Nice, epic point made
If you want everything to work offline your gonna need a phone with 10TB
... and the rest... http://www.answers.com/Q/How_large_is_the_Internet
I think download is needed for offline. Might need Wi-Fi for that...
Yay my name :P
Congratulations:)
Yay.. your name!!!
Yay.. His name.. Lol!!
Now that's what I call a name!!! Congrats sir.
This will be helpful every now and then
Memories of when my mum would just silently hand me a dictionary...lol Kids today... Just don't know.
Yeah, our smart phones are really just dumbing us down. I still love them, though!
I still make my kids use the dictionary though.
I mean what is the use? When you can get the meaning of a word in a second than to waste 10X the time. The kids would learn something else in that time. Why go for a book when an app can do the same function faster and sometimes superior in quality too. Yeah? :)
Because sometimes the effort of looking for something makes us remember it that much more.
Nope, not true, unless you need practice remembering how to flip pages and page numbers. In actuality, the presence of new, similar sounding words decreases focus, increases distractions, leading to...you get the point. Reference: decision making theory, also having tmi, too little information, or none at all makes learning one word a difficult task. Dictionaries provide the potential for any of the three scenarios in in the preceding sentence
While looking for a particular word in the dictionary, I'd sometimes get sidetracked by other words that I saw, so I'd stop to learn those along the way. In looking up one word, I usually learned other new words along the way. I attribute my extended vocab at an early age to that process. I think we really are starting to make things too easy for ourselves and justifying it with a "convenience" argument.
You sound like me. :-) I plan to teach my kids how to use both books and the internet for research as it never hurts for them to have the ability to be flexible. Same for desktops versus tablets.
Lol same reason why research papers/essays etc usually require not just online references but print ones too. The Dewey Decimal system would have died long ago if this wasn't common.
See what I mean, I agree.
I still use my Oxford dictionary :P I'm 17
You are a child, I applaud your use of a, dare I say it, a book. Throw in a thesaurus and your good. However, let us know how the distractions are working for you. We all experienced this phenomenon, it is what it is.
I remember I used to do ask Siri on my iPad. Glad I can ask the same to my very own personal assistant Cortana.
I wonder if Cortana is going to be this useful in Spanish or totally useless as google now in Spanish.
This isn't new... I've been using this since the days of Windows Phone 8. :/
You had Cortana since windows phone 8 devices ? Or you should say using this via tellme ;)
I never used TellMe much, very akin to how most of my Cortana queries are typed. I'm not fond of speaking aloud to my phone. That said, I used it on good ol' Bing Search.
As I clearly state, some definitions come from Bing.com, which is itself not that new, but you are incorrect about the Cortana/Oxford dictionary part not being new, as it is. Clearly Microsoft is expanding upon Bing.com search definitions by creating Cortana cards for the definition results.
Oh, /that/ I still remember using that starting late August. I didn't think it was a big deal. :/
Yes, it's old
i used it few weeks ago...
The thing to remember is not all of Cortana's functions reach everyone at the same time. Functions and new features are rolled out, which is why some users report having something early on, while others can take weeks to get it. Regardless, a cursory look at comments here suggest that most people were unaware of this Cortana feature.
Exactly, this is new for me. And certainly Cortana now helps me as a complement of the Advance English Dictionary app.
To support Daniel in this, I just tried it on my UK unlocked 920 & the result was still just a Web search. No special card for me yet. Will look out for it though.
When is this coming to the UK (properly) oh it's Microsoft, so I can expect it about 2019 when everyone has forgotten about. And windows phone wonder why there miles behind in sales, the way they trickle out EVERYTHING is a joke.
On my 925 (UK), she either brings up a web search or searches for songs... Any luck?
Nope. It's not worth bothering with. I've switched it off as a gimmick. Takes too long to react as well.
Both of these ^^
I thought I wouldn't use it, but I do...a lot. "Wake me up in 20 minutes" is awesome as a way to remind you of something (the alarm goes off rather than just the beep you'd get if you said "Alert me in 20 minutes"). The single most time-saving use of Cortana that I've found however is to look up contacts. I don't use the people hub very much as I have speed dial set up and a couple of other shortcuts for contacting my high frequency friends/colleagues etc. but hitting the Search button and saying "Contact John Smith" is fantastic. Or, if you want to call/email/text them then just say "Email John Smith" or"Call John Smith mobile". Particularly useful when you're walking about. And yes, I do think people who talk to their phones look ridiculous, so I do it discreetly :-) Anyway, I find myself a Cortana fan....something that I really wasn't expecting.
Great
Cortana should open apps even in offline that's should have been the case from first.
It still can...lol
Nope just says couldn't connect to internet.
Works for me. Just tried.
it will help me alot, as a student i was looking for this + it could be really great if i can have the meaning of any word in Arabic :) thanks MS thank you Cortana
Doesn't work in UK
Would be nice if she were voice activated once you tapped her icon.
Tap and hold search button
It would be nice if you notice she heard wrong and want to correct her before she starts searching and you hit back it doesn't close her.
well you also can use " define ___ "
Makes me laugh that it's out in the states, who speak ENGLISH but in England, where the language comes from, nothing (properly) . I've been buying Nokia since the 101 in 1992 but for the first time I'm thinking of leaving. Other companies launch an item (phone etc) and then you can buy, obvious thing to do. Microsoft (Nokia) no chance cant easily buy any of their stuff, always an effort, and always weeks and weeks after we've first seen it. I still haven't seen a 1520 in a shop. I live 50 miles from London. Joke.
Totally agree. Going to wait till my contract runs out next march for Microsoft to release something really good here in the UK. Otherwise, I'll go with iPhone 6 plus. Fed up with windows phone crawling like a snail with features, apps and so on. Btw, have been a huge Nokia fan since the nineties, but my patience is running low
That's amazing
It was there from the beginning.
Yeah, I've used it weeks before today.
I wish MS adds the ability to solve math problems in Cortana.
Right now Siri can do that. It can even differentiate and integrate equations.
Hope they add this soon.
I agree! My school says voice recognition could me helpful as well!
thank you Daniel ...... for mentioning me !!!
These features isn't available to alpha Cortana
AND I GOT A FREE DICTIONARY TODAY FROM O2 priority moments! Offer has ended
Microsoft should keep working harder on improving Cortana. Who knows Apple and Google are secretly working on their personal assistants too? In particular, Microsoft should make Cortana available in major languages of the world.
Cortana grows I love it. However, I am not tossing out my dictionaries.
For the users who don't have Cortana...You can also search for a meaning by ".... meaning". And Bing will come up with the results from Oxford Dictionary:D Try it.
Wow. So nice for me. I'm a native english speaker but still my 2nd language as for my 1st one is Spanish.
Ask Cortana "what is the mpg of a Toyota Camry" or any newer car. That works nice too.
This feature was there since long back... O.o
Wish she read the definition :)
Exactly
Does not even read aloud time n date. Lol
Was about to say the same thing. There are a lot of things you can ask Cortana to SHOW you, but with Motorola pushing the "hands off" experience with their new Moto X, Microsoft should be staying ahead of the curve. If my phone is on my desk charging and I'm on the couch or in bed; or it's in my pocket while I'm cooking, I'd like to be able to just ask it stuff and have it TELL me. That's the whole point of a voice assistant, right?
Yeah i hope so.... Use the narrator .. ;)
It should read aloud the meaning. It only says that it found the meaning of _________________.
I kinds wish Microsoft wouldn't announce features until their available to every country (or ever major country...or just major languages) so people would stop complaining and it'd be fair for everyone :/.
MS didn't announce that.
Life's not fair.
i've been waiting for this, and i wish i could simply say "what is a xxx?" and using this new command she never reads the definittion aloud, kind of disappointing but better than nothing i guess
Does she know the meaning of life?
Yes, 42.
We all shine on, my friend.
Wow, I would be happier about this if I had cortana -.-" +521
Really a good feature to have especially in India like country where English is a must learn second language. Welcome Microsoft. Bring Cortana soon to India.
Nice
I've been saying "Define _" which also works.
Awesome!
Anyone can't be able to connect to age of empire Cs server???
M2 it says out of sync
http://www.wpcentral.com/commenting-guidelines
Microsoft, what do you want me to do in exchange for bringing Cortana to my country? I do everything. I can be a very bad boy if you like ;) I apologize but I had to try at least once. By the way is Cortana - yes, it's a female name - available with a male voice too?
Not working in the UK, which is odd!
So i had an extra iPhone 6 Gold/White in the office yesterday so I took the oportunity to get back on AT&T and off my Verizon HTC One M8 with Windows. Boy was that a giant mistake. The iPhone 6 sucks!!! Mainly because Siri is terrible along with the battery. I thought for sure I could put up with iOS 8 for a few weeks till ATT got the next Nokia but, I just couldn't take it. I spent 2 hours at AT&T today to desperately get back to Nokia/Microsoft. Now I'm on a lovely Red Nokia 1520 and so very happy.
I tried the iPhone 6 at Heathrow terminal 5 yesterday. Whilst it felt great in the hand, slim and sturdy, the OS looks and feel so dated compared to Windows phone IMO. Those grids of rounded icons are so 2007!!!
I usually just search for the word. If that doesn't work you can add the word "define" before the word you need the definition for and it will show you the same thing.
Nice! Been waiting on this!
Awesome! Cortana continues to kick as$!!
Whatever happened to the Oxford Dictionary app by the way? At least it worked offline. Tried downloading it again and it was unavailable...
Not in uk . She still a silly biacth
Ask cortana when it will available in india
Cortana is available in India as an alpha version...
Freaking awesome
Thought its always done this lol
Well that's a nice addition!
Hey that's! Awesome! Seriously! But how does this come before dictating punctuation on the feature list?!?!?
Would it work to say "define ________ " like in Google?
Yes, just tried it.
Great! Thanks
Is it updated on alpha version India?? And I have seen Siri plot a quadratic graph , is Cortana able to do that??
Awesome!
I think, we will get a new app, Bing dictionary. When you open Cortana, ask "what does .... mean", and then press "see more", you'll see at the top "bing dictionary"....
Sir, I have a question... If I bring Cortana in my Lumia 525 in India.. By changing region ,speech and etc.. Will that hinder me from getting any service.. As I stay in India.. But I want to taste cortana.. What services can I lose if I change those...
Ask Cortana what Cortana means;
"I'm named after Cortana, the AI from Halo. Or Since she is from 500 years in the future, she may have named herself after me" Posted via Windows Phone Central App
If you switch regions you also switch the store apps, meaning apps that are on the Indian Windows Phone Store aren't available there. That's the only thing.
Ok ... So I'm not going to get apps like which are Indian made... But will there be any problem for location service.. And update receiving...
Nice new feature
Ask Cortana "Who is Steve Jobs?"
Compare it to "who is Bill Gates?", odd.
It is easier just say "Define (word)".
"Define _____" works too.
We also can say "define xyz"
Edit: I'm late :|
Damnit Cortana I asked for the meaning of life and she said 42.
according to Wikipedia means 42
Now translate!! That would be awesome.
that's possible with bing translator integration.
Does this work in the UK?
it does not work in India
This will actually be helpful! "Define <word>" works also. As others said, a translate command would be even better
Now asking anything to cortana first takes u to search n then no voice reply from her :-/
Show me , whose talking about offline Cortana to shot them nowwww :| ?? How to recognize the huge number of the words ?? It's possible, but not now :D
Sounds good; would help if Cortana was actually available for most of us...
It only works in the US where they hate Windows Phone.
Would be nice of it read the definition aloud too
Miss the feature of highlighting text and hitting the search button...
Maybe, just maybe they should focus on making Cortana available to other regions... Getting tired of this US only bs. I really don't care if I have to talk English but at least make it available...
this^ tjye should arrange Cortana team for every country.
Doesn't work on my Lumia 920 dev device running preview.
I prefer to type "define [word]"
Don't know what that word means? Just ask Cortana. Cortana, define "inconceivable."
Nice
This has worked for me for a long time!!!
What does Cortana mean? It means Cortana. :P Chiefs best girlfriend.
Ask her the meaning of the word life
You can also say "Define _____"
Cool more things that bore siri cant do now add dictionary support or cortana integration in win9
Very useful. Microsoft does listen:)))
Unlike Cortana - "I'm sorry, I didn't quite catch that" ;)
I wish Cortana will tell me what unread emails and text messages I have.
I've listed something similar in a Cortana "wishlist" thread in the forums. I think it'd be awesome if you could ask her what unread notifications you have, and then get her to read the notifications for an app. Like "Read my Messenger notifications" :D
When is cortana coming to india in official update ?
Cool, I was expecting her usual bing search but instead . . . she recommended a wikipedia page. Awesome. Oh and she's also forgotten my name again.
I use this feature all the time. Sometimes, if a word is unusual enough, I just type it in without explicitly asking for a definition and I still get the spiffy little Oxford definition card result.
Can someone ask her when she plans on coming to the uk on 930??
Still waiting for the Dutch version though
Cortana in the UK
Cortana is a cloud based Voice assistant, which makes its easier for Microsoft to keep improving her without releasing big updates , but its possible they will improve Cortana's offline capabilities in the future.
First time I heard Cortana saying "F**k" when I asked her what does it mean, lol
This is a amazing and innovative feature. I guess Siri doesn't have this.
Cortana keeps getting better and better, now she just needs to get rid of the location requirement and I'll actually use her
Not working in India.. Why didn't anything work in India?
I tipped you guys weeks ago, but you ignored it till neowin broke the news.
Alpha Cortana in India SUCKS.
Knew this feature already. Even though thanks.
Not working in Aus... :(
Nice feature especially like me who still learning English :)
Or simply say Define ------ it will get same result as in what is the meaning of -------
Day by day..its improving..nice
Hi guys I m from India and I use Cortana (beta) version and it seems nice experience to use Cortana, now I m waiting for release of alpha version, plz make core apps that can work with third party apps as Cortana does it, try out the clock apps that could work like Symbian handsets did
What the hell are you trying to say??
What does it mean that"Cyan is still not available for DP"?
Cortana can also find the meaning by asking WHAT IS ___? Then she uses Bing.com dictionary.
Doesn't work in India
Guys just try the meaning of words like fuck,asshole,retarted whatever and I'll see some magic!Try it!
Doesnt work for me (UK). Any question like that return a web search. Well 90% of anything I tell cortana returns a web search. The only thing that works is turning things on and off like Bluetooth, or setting up alarms. But unlike Siri, Cortana doesn't even handle a simple request like: "Setup a countdown (or timer) for 25 minutes"
Useful when cooking or doing something. I don't know if this is because I'm in the UK but I hope this gets better. Siri in my ipod touch is much useful.
Instead of saying so much, "What is the meaning of ____" you can just say "Define ____". The result in both cases is the same.
I just wish she would call me by name. I don't understand why that feature has yet to be enabled.
One thing I like on iOS is when I am reading something I can select a word and a "define" option pops up. This works system-wide. Clicking on this will provide the definition using the built in offline dictionary. http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/tips/comments/getting-a-word-definition... Does Windows Phone have such a feature?
I don't mean to sound like a smartass, but I've been using this at least a year or two. I wish Cortana could actually read the definition to you.
Then people will rely on Digital Personal Assistants in the near future Cortana and Siri , both are an example
A convenient way to look up a word I don't recognize from a book I'm reading currently.
This is of course nice, but all activities of cortana are limited to its app and do not really reach outside. I know this is API issue and developers need to get involved, but at least Cortana should work well within microsoft own bing apps. Why does cortana use its own weather info, when it could simply reach into my existing bing weather app and use my setting (celsius), etc. Why cant i for instance ask how many steps have i made today since i have my lumia 930 count them. Or when i say turn on the silent mode, why doesn't cortana turn on quiet hours automatically, asking me for how long. Right now cortana limits herself to notes and appointment taking, which doesn't seem to even replicate around my other devices...
US ONLY!
Doesnt read it though :(
I think cortana should bring up meaning of words from different dictionaries,not only oxford
cortana! youre making people more lazy! they could just find the dictionary app and type it there!
I thought the capability to search the meaning of the word has already been built in in the past? At least I'm sure I've used that feature before. Or maybe this new updates are more polished?
I can't understand that which version of Cortana is better or upgraded, ALPHA or BETA???
Not interested until an alpha release in Mexico
Need uk cortana, all these add on features is frustrating when you don't actually have Cortana in the UK.
Is this feature available in ALPA too because for me in India it does not give any meaning
Hey if Cortana could download half of the internet, that is enough info and videos to last a long time.
I have wimdowsphone 8,1 lumia 920 the new update has come but there is no cortana on my phone why is that?? No cortana in apps to download so what to do..?
how will get info offline?

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