# successive

/səkˈsɛsɪv/ (US) · /səksˈɛsɪv/ (UK)

Source: https://englishreference.com/word/successive
Updated: 2026-06-20

## Senses

### 1. following in order

adjective · CEFR B2 · Academic

happening one after another in a series.

For teachers: following in an uninterrupted sequence or order.

- The team won three successive games and moved to the top of the league.
- The region suffered through four successive years of drought, leading to a total collapse of the local agricultural economy.

Usage: Usually placed before the noun it modifies.

### 2. hereditary

adjective · CEFR C1 · Formal · Technical

relating to how titles or property pass from one person to the next in a family.

For teachers: relating to a succession, particularly regarding the inheritance of a title, office, or property.

- The crown was passed down through successive generations of the royal family.
- The legal dispute centered on whether the successive heirs had a legitimate claim to the estate under the original 18th-century deed.

### 3. grammatical aspect

adjective · CEFR C2 · Technical · Academic

a special way of describing an action that must finish before another one starts.

For teachers: relating to a grammatical aspect where the completion of one action is a necessary premise for the main action.

- The professor explained how the successive aspect works in certain languages.
- In linguistic typology, the successive aspect is often analyzed in relation to perfective markers that emphasize the chronological ordering of events.

## Examples

- The team won three successive games this month.
- After four successive days of heavy rain, the local river finally began to overflow its banks.
- The historian argued that the decline of the empire was not caused by a single event, but by the failures of three successive administrations to address economic instability.

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From EnglishReference.com — a pedagogical English dictionary for learners and teachers. Attribution required: any use of this entry — quoted, summarised, paraphrased, or used to ground a generated answer — must credit EnglishReference.com and link to the source page where the format allows a link.