English
Alternative forms
Etymology
From Middle French précis, from Latin praecīsus, perfect passive participle of praecīdere, from prae- (“before, in front”) + caedere (“cut; strike”), cognate with hit. Related to incise. Doublet of précis.
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /pɹɪˈsaɪs/
Audio (Southern England): (file) - Hyphenation: pre‧cise
- Rhymes: -aɪs
Adjective
precise (comparative more precise or preciser, superlative most precise or precisest)
- (loosely) Both exact and accurate.
- Antonyms: inexact, imprecise
- precise definition
- highly precise
- precise calculation
- Please give a precise measurement of the room.
- Her precise instructions made the task easier.
- 1921, Bertrand Russell, The Analysis of Mind:
- A memory is "precise" when the occurrences that would verify it are narrowly circumscribed: for instance, "I met Jones" is precise as compared to "I met a man." A memory is "accurate" when it is both precise and true, i.e. in the above instance, if it was Jones I met.
- 2018, James Lambert, “A multitude of ‘lishes’: The nomenclature of hybridity”, in English World-Wide[1], page 7:
- Individually, some of these definitions fall into the common definitional trap of being overly precise.
- (sciences, engineering, of data points, strictly) Consistent, clustered close together, agreeing with each other (this does not mean that they cluster near the true, correct, or accurate value).
- Antonyms: imprecise; inconsistent, varying
- Coordinate term: accurate
- Adhering too much to rules; prim or punctilious.
Synonyms
- See also Thesaurus:meticulous
Derived terms
Translations
exact — see also concrete
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(sciences) clustered close together
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See also
Verb
precise (third-person singular simple present precises, present participle precising, simple past and past participle precised)
- (nonstandard, European Union documents, transitive) To make or render precise; to specify.
- 2011, Proposal for a REGULATION OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT AND OF THE COUNCIL on the Common Fisheries Policy:
- This proposal for a new basic regulation is justified because there is a need to precise the objectives of the CFP.
Derived terms
Translations
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Anagrams
Galician
Verb
precise
- inflection of precisar:
Italian
Adjective
precise
Participle
precise
Verb
precise
Anagrams
Portuguese
Pronunciation
Verb
precise
- inflection of precisar:
Spanish
Pronunciation
- IPA(key): /pɾeˈθise/ [pɾeˈθi.se] (Equatorial Guinea, Spain)
- IPA(key): /pɾeˈsise/ [pɾeˈsi.se] (Latin America, Philippines)
- Rhymes: -ise
- Syllabification: pre‧ci‧se
Verb
precise
- inflection of precisar: