composite
adjective · noun · verb
Simple meaning
Having factors other than itself and one.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
kuhmpahzuhtSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
kəmˈpɑzət
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
adjective
Made up of multiple components; compound or complex.
mathematics
Having factors other than itself and one; not prime and not one.
noun
A mixture of different components.
A structural material that gains its strength from a combination of complementary materials.
verb
To make a composite.
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- B1 · Intermediate (estimated)
- Frequency
- Common
- Typical Use
- General English
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: Having factors other than itself and one; not prime and not one.
Used this way, composite is a specialist word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. This is a mathematical use: it is defined precisely and belongs to working with figures and calculations rather than to ordinary conversation.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Specialist/technical
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Specialized
- Connotation
- Clinical and technical
- Usage feel
- Technical and specialized
Where it naturally appears
- Mathematics
- Geometry
- Academic writing
- Education/classroom
Usage note
In general conversation this sense usually needs explaining — outside its field, people reach for a plainer word.
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Compound terms
Established multiword terms.
Considered the most highly evolved dicotyledonous plants, characterized by florets arranged in dense heads that resemble single flowers.
A large British or Canadian secondary school for children of all abilities.
Strong lightweight material developed in the laboratory.
An integer that is divisible without remainder by at least one positive integer other than itself and one.
A Roman order that combines the Corinthian acanthus leaves with the spiral scrolls of the Ionic order.
Related Words
Connected to the same idea, not synonyms.
- ceramicadjective
- polymernoun
- fiberglassnoun
- carbonnoun
- armornoun
More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin
Synonyms
Sense: made up of multiple components
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.