characteristic

UK: /ˌkærɪktəˈrɪstɪk/

US: /ˌkærɪktəˈrɪstɪk/

US: (kar′ik tə ris′tik)

WordReference Random House Learner's Dictionary of American English © 2026

char•ac•ter•is•tic /ˌkærɪktəˈrɪstɪk/   adj. 

1. showing the character of a person or thing;
   typical:
   It was characteristic of her not to take all the credit.

n. [countable]

2. a quality (of someone or something) that is typical or special:
   She had the high forehead that is a characteristic of that family.

char•ac•ter•is•ti•cal•ly, adv. 

WordReference Random House Unabridged Dictionary of American English © 2026

char•ac•ter•is•tic  (kar′ik tə ris′tik), adj. 

1. Also, char′ac•ter•is′ti•cal. pertaining to, constituting, or indicating the character or peculiar quality of a person or thing;
   typical;
   distinctive:
   Red and gold are the characteristic colors of autumn.

n. 

2. a distinguishing feature or quality:
   Generosity is his chief characteristic.
3. Mathematics
   • the integral part of a common logarithm. Cf. mantissa.
   • the exponent of 10 in a number expressed in scientific notation.
   • the smallest positive integer n such that each element of a given ring added to itself n times results in 0.

• Greek charaktēristikós. See character, -istic
• 1655–65

char′ac•ter•is′ti•cal•ly, adv. 
Synonyms

• 1. special, peculiar.
• 2. attribute, property, trait. See feature. 

Collins Concise English Dictionary © HarperCollins Publishers::

characteristic / ˌkærɪktəˈrɪstɪk/ noun

1. a distinguishing quality, attribute, or trait
2. the integral part of a common logarithm, indicating the order of magnitude of the associated number: the characteristic of 2.4771 is 2
   Compare mantissa
3. another name for exponent, used esp in number representation in computing

adjective

1. indicative of a distinctive quality, etc; typical

ˌcharacterˈistically adverb