Meaning & use
provisional approval
Last updated
Meaning
noununcountable
Permission given for now, on the understanding that it is not final and may depend on further checks or conditions.
Grammar: Usually uncountable: the plan received provisional approval; a provisional approval is also possible for a single decision.
Patterns
- give someone provisional approval
- provisional approval for something
- provisional approval subject to something
The council gave provisional approval to the new housing plan.
The drug received provisional approval, pending the results of a larger trial.
Provisional approval is subject to a safety inspection next month.
Common combinations
- grant provisional approval
- The board will grant provisional approval if the budget is revised.
- receive provisional approval
- Our loan application received provisional approval on Friday.
- provisional approval for
- The agency issued provisional approval for the vaccine.
- subject to provisional approval
- The sale is subject to provisional approval from the bank.
Synonyms and how they differ
- conditional approval
- Conditional approval stresses that specific conditions must be met, while provisional approval stresses that the decision is temporary.
- tentative approval
- Tentative approval sounds less official and suggests more doubt than provisional approval.
- interim approval
- Interim approval covers a set period until a final decision, rather than depending on conditions.
Opposites
Word family
- provisional adjective
- arranged for now and likely to change
- provisionally adverb
- in a temporary way
- approve verb
- to officially accept something
- approval noun
- official agreement or permission
Commonly confused: provisional approval or provisional license?
provisional approval vs provisional license
A provisional license is a temporary driving permit for learners, a specific document rather than a general decision.
Practice
The planning office said the extension had provisional approval. What does that mean?
Choose one answer.
Provisional approval is temporary and open to revision. Permanent approval would be final, which provisional rules out.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “provisional approval”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.