AMAB

Meanings

1. 1abbreviationtechnical

   Used to describe a person who was assigned male at birth, based on physical characteristics, regardless of their current gender identity.

   Grammar: Used mainly as an adjective before a noun, or after the verb 'be', as in 'I am AMAB'.

   Patterns

   • be AMAB
   • an AMAB person
   • AMAB people

   She is AMAB, but she has always known herself to be a woman.

   The survey asked whether respondents were AMAB or AFAB.

   Some AMAB people take hormones to align their bodies with their gender identity.

2. 2abbreviationtechnicalmedical

   Used in medical and legal writing to record the sex a baby was said to be at birth, often for statistical or clinical purposes.

   Grammar: Often appears in forms and charts as a category, e.g. 'Sex assigned at birth: AMAB'.

   Patterns

   • record someone as AMAB
   • listed as AMAB
   • AMAB category

   The hospital form had a box for AMAB, AFAB, or intersex.

   In the study, 40% of participants were AMAB.

   The doctor noted that the patient was AMAB but had been living as a woman for years.

Common combinations

AMAB person

The group is open to AMAB people who are exploring their gender.

assigned male at birth

He was assigned male at birth, but now identifies as non-binary.

AMAB and AFAB

The form asked whether I was AMAB or AFAB.

AMAB body

Some medical texts still use the phrase 'AMAB body' when discussing anatomy.

Synonyms and how they differ

male-assigned

A less common adjective that means the same, but it is not an initialism and is used mostly in activist writing.

birth-assigned male

A descriptive phrase rather than a fixed term; it is clearer in everyday speech but longer.

Opposites

Word family

AFAB abbreviation

Assigned female at birth; the matching term for someone recorded as female at birth.

Commonly confused: AMAB or trans man?

Practice

Make it your own

Write a sentence using “AMAB”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.

Explore more words