petty
adjective
Simple meaning
Secondary in importance or rank.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
pehteeSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈpɛti
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
Secondary in importance or rank; minor, subordinate.
Little or small in size.
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: Little or small in size.
Used this way, petty is a reasonably familiar word with a clearly unfavourable pull. It stays understated rather than dramatic. It usually sounds natural in a wide range of settings.
- Emotional tone
- Negative
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Mild
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Serious and weighty
- Usage feel
- Neutral and straightforward
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
More ways to use petty
- “The shoplifter was charged with petty larceny for taking a candy bar.”noun
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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.