omniscient
adjective
Ira Konigsberg
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What is the origin of omniscient?
One who is omniscient literally knows all. The word omniscient traces back to two Latin roots: omni-, meaning "all" or "universally," and the noun scientia, meaning "knowledge." You will recognize omni- as the prefix that tells all in such words as omnivorous ("eating all," or in actual use, "eating both plants and animals") and omnipotent ("all-powerful"). Scientia comes from the Latin verb scīre, meaning "to know," which likewise has a number of other knowledge-related descendants in English, including conscience, science, and prescience (meaning "foreknowledge").
Examples of omniscient in a Sentence
Daysia Tolentino, Entertainment Weekly, 13 Sep. 2025
All the more unusually, the story is told not only through onscreen drama but literally: a voice-over by an unnamed omniscient narrator (played by Jacek Zubiel) sketches motives and memories, backstory and incidental details, and even forthcoming events.
—Richard Brody, New Yorker, 4 Sep. 2025
In our world there is no such thing as an omniscient narrator.
—Adam Verner
september 3, Literary Hub, 3 Sep. 2025
So, the narrative that AI is omniscient and omnipotent at displacing labor works well to convince investors to pay inflated valuation premiums for companies that expend huge resources on building data centers and hiring AI engineers and data scientists.
—Shivaram Rajgopal, Forbes.com, 17 Aug. 2025
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Cite this Entry
“Omniscient.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/omniscient. Accessed 23 Sep. 2025.
Copy CitationKids Definition
from modern Latin omniscient-, omnisciens "knowing all things, all-knowing," derived from omni- (from omnis "all") and scient-, sciens "knowing," from scire "to know" — related to science
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