critical

noun

A critical value, factor, etc.

In breakdancing, a kind of airflare move in which the dancer hops from one hand to the other.

adjective

Extremely important.

Inclined to find fault or criticize.

Pertaining to, or indicating, a crisis or turning point.

Relating to criticism or careful analysis, such as literary or film criticism.

(medicine) Of a patient condition involving unstable vital signs and a prognosis that predicts the condition could worsen; or, a patient condition that requires urgent treatment in an intensive care or critical care medical facility.

(medicine, by extension) In such a condition.

(textual criticism) Employing or related to textual criticism, particularly through a stemmatological comparison of all extant texts and reconstruction of the original.

Likely to go out of control if disturbed, that is, opposite of stable.

(physics) Of the point (in temperature, reagent concentration etc.) where a nuclear or chemical reaction becomes self-sustaining.

(physics) Of a temperature that is equal to the temperature of the critical point of a substance, i.e. the temperature above which the substance cannot be liquefied.

(botany) Needing great discrimination to be correctly classified; easily confused.

Roots

krinocrit- · Greek · judge

Synonyms for critical

vitaladj crucialadj decisiveadj hypercriticaladj importantadj pivotaladj deprecativeadj essentialadj overcriticaladj censoriousadj criticn imperativeadj momentousadj significantadj judgmentaladj seriousadj keyadj

Synonyms & related words for critical

Find synonyms, related words, and the definition of critical — including vital, crucial, decisive, hypercritical, important, pivotal. Dendril is a free visual thesaurus that shows them on an interactive map where stronger matches sit closer to the center — no signup, no ads.

Words related to critical

Explore words related to critical — words associated with it, words that go with it, and its nearest matches in meaning. Related words include cruciality, criticalness, critically, noncritical, criticality, subcritical, supercritical, indispensable. Click any word to make it the center of the map and keep exploring the web of connections.

Synonyms for critical

Common synonyms for critical include vital, crucial, decisive, hypercritical, important, pivotal, deprecative, essential — words that share a close meaning. Hover or tap any word on the map for its definition and part of speech.

Where does critical come from?

The word critical breaks down into one root of Greek origin: the root crit-, from Greek krino (“judge”). Explore each root to see other English words built from the same source.