Meaning & use
fully functioning
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Meanings
adjectivebefore a noun
Working completely well, with every part doing what it should, or able to do all the normal things in life.
Grammar: Usually comes before a noun: a fully functioning system. It can also follow be: the system is fully functioning.
Patterns
- a fully functioning + noun
- be fully functioning
After the repair, the elevator is fully functioning again.
The clinic aims to help patients return to being fully functioning adults.
We need a fully functioning kitchen before we move in.
adjectivebefore a nountechnical
Describing a person who can manage normal daily activities without help.
Grammar: Often used in medical or social-care writing about people recovering from illness or injury.
Patterns
- a fully functioning person
- remain fully functioning
With the right support, most patients remain fully functioning at home.
She was fully functioning within a month of the operation.
Common combinations
- a fully functioning democracy
- Voters want a fully functioning democracy, not just elections on paper.
- fully functioning adult
- He pays his own bills and lives like a fully functioning adult.
- remain fully functioning
- The backup generator must remain fully functioning during a storm.
- fully functioning body
- Regular exercise keeps the heart and lungs fully functioning.
Synonyms and how they differ
- working
- Simpler and more general; 'working' can just mean 'not broken', while 'fully functioning' stresses that everything works completely.
- operational
- More formal and mostly used for machines, systems or businesses, not for people.
- healthy
- Focuses on the body being free of illness; 'fully functioning' is about doing all normal activities.
Opposites
Word family
- function verb
- To work or operate in the correct way.
- function noun
- The purpose or job that something is designed to do.
- functional adjective
- Designed to be useful and practical rather than attractive.
- dysfunctional adjective
- Not working properly, especially of families or systems.
Commonly confused: fully functioning or fully-functional?
fully functioning vs fully-functional
The hyphenated spelling is common in headlines, but standard writing uses two words with no hyphen: fully functioning.
Practice
Which sentence uses 'fully functioning' correctly?
Choose one answer.
'Fully functioning' follows the verb be as a description: the car is fully functioning. Option 2 puts the phrase in the wrong place and option 4 mixes a verb with 'is'. Option 3 changes the fixed phrase and sounds unnatural here.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “fully functioning”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.