see usage paragraph below
: carrying, staffed, or performed by one or more people
a manned security booth
manned spaceflight
a manned mission
Usage of Manned and Unmanned
While manned and unmanned are still commonly used in news sources to describe spaceflights with and without human crews, respectively, NASA has since the early 21st century used and prescribed non-gender-specific terms, preferring such descriptors as human, piloted, and crewed for the former, and unpiloted and uncrewed for the latter.
Examples of manned in a Sentence
a manned mission to the moon
Recent Examples on the Web
The muted mood in the West Bank — where there are now more than 1,200 Israeli-manned checkpoints and gates, making travel very difficult — is a far cry from celebrations that broke out back in 2012 when the UN upgraded Palestine to observer state status.
—
Chandelis Duster, NPR, 21 Sep. 2025
That poses a challenge for some of NATO’s more traditional air defence systems, which were designed to protect against missiles and manned aircraft.
—Andrew Gray, USA Today, 11 Sep. 2025
The statement said that between sunrise and sunset, the no-fly zone would apply except for manned aircraft which had filed a flight plan and had a transponder switched on.
—Brendan Cole
john Feng, MSNBC Newsweek, 11 Sep. 2025
Because of this, a very limited manned mission to Mars is just about the absolute limit for a chemical rocket engine.
—David Szondy
september 10, New Atlas, 10 Sep. 2025
See All Example Sentences for manned
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Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors.
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Chandelis Duster, NPR, 21 Sep. 2025
That poses a challenge for some of NATO’s more traditional air defence systems, which were designed to protect against missiles and manned aircraft.
—Andrew Gray, USA Today, 11 Sep. 2025
The statement said that between sunrise and sunset, the no-fly zone would apply except for manned aircraft which had filed a flight plan and had a transponder switched on.
—Brendan Cole
john Feng, MSNBC Newsweek, 11 Sep. 2025
Because of this, a very limited manned mission to Mars is just about the absolute limit for a chemical rocket engine.
—David Szondy
september 10, New Atlas, 10 Sep. 2025
See All Example Sentences for manned
Cite this Entry
“Manned.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/manned. Accessed 1 Oct. 2025.
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manned
adjective
: carrying or performed by a person
manned spaceflight
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