verb [VN] (rather formal)
1 to keep sth; to continue to have sth:
to retain your freedom / independence * He struggled to retain control of the situation. * The house retains much of its original charm. * She retained her tennis title for the third year.
2 to continue to hold or contain sth:
a soil that retains moisture * This information is no longer retained within the computer's main memory. * (figurative) She has a good memory and finds it easy to retain facts.
3 (law) if a member of the public retains sb such as a lawyer, he or she pays money regularly or in advance so the lawyer, etc. will do work for him or her:
a retaining fee * to retain the services of a lawyer
seealsoRETENTION, RETENTIVE
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About this entry
This is a English–English dictionary entry.
Sourced from Main Dictionary in Lughet's collection.
This word also appears under other sources in Lughet's collection — see the list below.
This entry for retain is sourced from Main Dictionary, one of the dictionaries and corpora merged into Lughet.
Does retain appear elsewhere on Lughet?
Yes — retain appears under other sources or language pairs in Lughet's collection. See the list below.
What is Lughet?
Lughet is a free trilingual dictionary covering nearly five million entries across Uyghur, Chinese, and English, drawn from more than ten source dictionaries and corpora.
