Legitimate
Legitimate adjective - Permitted by law.
Usage example: the mistrust created among investors by the financial scandal has hurt even companies engaged in wholly legitimate business practices
Proper is a synonym for legitimate in regular topic. In some cases you can use "Proper" instead an adjective "Legitimate", when it comes to topics like lawful, valid, rightful, authentic.
Proper
Proper adjective - Being in agreement with the truth or a fact or a standard.
Usage example: there is really more than one proper way to pronounce that word in English
Legitimate is a synonym for proper in regular topic. You can use "Legitimate" instead an adjective "Proper", if it concerns topics such as correct, suitable.
Mutual synonyms
Both words in one sentence
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A surprising number of legitimate accounts get flagged, especially those with proper names containing an embedded obscenity or slur (Nazir, Takeshita, etc.).
Source: Scunthorpe Problem -
In a larger sense, episodes like "Next Top Villain" and "Counter Productive" show that villainy in itself isn't disapproved and is even seen as a legitimate career path, if not quite as glamorous as heroism, as long as proper procedure is followed.
Source: Western Animation / Sonic Boom -
To further muddle the issue, if you returned the stolen item, you would learn that the quest-giver is not the legitimate owner, which in turn gives the choice between Honor in sticking to the original agreement or Honesty in delivering the item to its proper place.
Source: Karma Meter
Cite this Source
Proper and Legitimate. (2016). Retrieved 2026, August 16, from https://thesaurus.plus/related/legitimate/proper
Legitimate & Proper. N.p., 2016. Web. 16 Aug. 2026. <https://thesaurus.plus/related/legitimate/proper>.
Proper or Legitimate. 2016. Accessed August 16, 2026. https://thesaurus.plus/related/legitimate/proper.
Google Ngram Viewer shows how "legitimate" and "proper" have occurred on timeline