Accept vs. Decline — What's the Difference?

To answer affirmatively

(typically of something regarded as good) become smaller, fewer, or less; decrease

To agree to take (a duty or responsibility).

Politely refuse (an invitation or offer)

To receive (something offered), especially with gladness or approval

(especially of the sun) move downwards

To admit to a group, organization, or place

(in the grammar of Latin, Greek, and certain other languages) state the forms of (a noun, pronoun, or adjective) corresponding to case, number, and gender.

To regard as proper, usual, or right

A gradual and continuous loss of strength, numbers, quality, or value

To regard as true; believe in

To express polite refusal

To understand as having a specific meaning.

To slope downward; descend

To endure resignedly or patiently

To bend downward; droop

To be able to hold (something applied or inserted)

To degrade or lower oneself; stoop

To receive officially

To deteriorate gradually; fail

To consent to pay, as by a signed agreement.

To sink, as the setting sun.

To take payment in the form of

To draw to a gradual close

(Medicine) To receive (a transplanted organ or tissue) without immunological rejection.

To refuse politely

To receive something, especially with favor. Often used with of.

Downward movement, fall.en

(transitive) To receive, especially with a consent, with favour, or with approval.

A sloping downward, e.g. of a hill or road.en

(transitive) To admit to a place or a group.

A weakening.en

(transitive) To regard as proper, usual, true, or to believe in.

A reduction or diminution of activity.

(transitive) To receive as adequate or satisfactory.

The act of declining or refusing something.

(transitive) To receive or admit to; to agree to; to assent to; to submit to.

(intransitive) To move downwards, to fall, to drop.

(transitive) To endure patiently.

(intransitive) To become weaker or worse.

(transitive) To acknowledge patiently without opposition or resistance.

(transitive) To bend downward; to bring down; to depress; to cause to bend, or fall.

To agree to pay.

(transitive) To cause to decrease or diminish.

(transitive) To receive officially.

To turn or bend aside; to deviate; to stray; to withdraw.

(intransitive) To receive something willingly.

(transitive) To choose not to do something; refuse, forbear, refrain.

(obsolete) Accepted.

To inflect for case, number, gender, and the like.

To receive with a consenting mind (something offered); as, to accept a gift; - often followed by of.

To recite all the different declined forms of (a word).

To receive with favor; to approve.

(by extension) To run through from first to last; to recite in order as though declining a noun.

To receive or admit and agree to; to assent to; as, I accept your proposal, amendment, or excuse.

To reject a penalty against the opposing team, usually because the result of accepting it would benefit the non-penalized team less than the preceding play.

To take by the mind; to understand; as, How are these words to be accepted?

To bend, or lean downward; to take a downward direction; to bend over or hang down, as from weakness, weariness, despondency, etc.; to condescend.

To receive as obligatory and promise to pay; as, to accept a bill of exchange.

To tend or draw towards a close, decay, or extinction; to tend to a less perfect state; to become diminished or impaired; to fail; to sink; to diminish; to lessen; as, the day declines; virtue declines; religion declines; business declines.

In a deliberate body, to receive in acquittance of a duty imposed; as, to accept the report of a committee. [This makes it the property of the body, and the question is then on its adoption.]

To turn or bend aside; to deviate; to stray; to withdraw; as, a line that declines from straightness; conduct that declines from sound morals.

Accepted.

To turn away; to shun; to refuse; - the opposite of accept or consent; as, he declined, upon principle.

Consider or hold as true;

To bend downward; to bring down; to depress; to cause to bend, or fall.

Receive willingly something given or offered;

To cause to decrease or diminish.

Give an affirmative reply to; respond favorably to;

To put or turn aside; to turn off or away from; to refuse to undertake or comply with; reject; to shun; to avoid; as, to decline an offer; to decline a contest; he declined any participation with them.

React favorably to; consider right and proper;

To inflect, or rehearse in order the changes of grammatical form of; as, to decline a noun or an adjective.

Admit into a group or community;

To run through from first to last; to repeat like a schoolboy declining a noun.

Take on as one's own the expenses or debts of another person;

A falling off; a tendency to a worse state; diminution or decay; deterioration; also, the period when a thing is tending toward extinction or a less perfect state; as, the decline of life; the decline of strength; the decline of virtue and religion.

Tolerate or accommodate oneself to;

That period of a disorder or paroxysm when the symptoms begin to abate in violence; as, the decline of a fever.

Be designed to hold or take;

A gradual sinking and wasting away of the physical faculties; any wasting disease, esp. pulmonary consumption; as, to die of a decline.

Of a deliberative body: receive (a report) officially, as from a committee

Change toward something smaller or lower

Make use of or accept for some purpose;

A condition inferior to an earlier condition; a gradual falling off from a better state

Be sexually responsive to, used of a female domesticated mammal;

A gradual decrease; as of stored charge or current

A downward slope or bend

Grow worse;

Refuse to accept;

Show unwillingness towards;

Grow smaller;

Go down;

Go down in value;

Inflect for number, gender, case, etc.,