arbitrary
UK/ˈɑː.bɪ.tɹə.ɹi//ˈɑɹ.bɪˌtɹɛɹ.i/
arbitrary adjective: based on individual discretion or judgment; not based on any objective distinction, perhaps even made at random.
Adjective
arbitrary (comparative more arbitrary, superlative most arbitrary)
- Based on individual discretion or judgment; not based on any objective distinction, perhaps even made at random.
- Benjamin Franklin's designation of "positive" and "negative" to different charges was arbitrary.
- The decision to use 18 years as the legal age of adulthood was arbitrary, as both age 17 and 19 were reasonable alternatives.
- Determined by impulse rather than reason; often connoting heavy-handedness.
- 1937/1938, Albert Einstein, letter to Max Born
The Russian trials were Stalin's purges, with which he attempted to consolidate his power. Like most people in the West, I believed these show trials to be the arbitrary acts of a cruel dictator. - The bromide conforms to everything sanctioned by the majority, and may be depended upon to be trite, banal, and arbitrary.1906, Gelett Burgess, Are You a Bromide?
- 1937/1938, Albert Einstein, letter to Max Born
- Any, out of all that are possible.
- The equation is true for an arbitrary value of x.
- Determined by independent arbiter.
- Not representative or symbolic; not iconic.
Noun
arbitrary (plural arbitraries)
- Anything arbitrary, such as an arithmetical value or a fee.
- And in this long chain of consistence, a chain stretching from the long dead to the far unborn, the notion of the arbitrary could only survive as the notion of a pre-established arbitrary.1953, Samuel Beckett, Watt, [Paris]: Olympia Press, →OCLC
arbitrary meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu
arbitrary in Hindi
- based on individual discretion or judgment
- यादृच्छिक yādŕcchik
arbitrary in Tamil
- விதிக்கட்டின்றி, மனப்போக்கான, கொடுங்கோன்மையான, விருப்பப்படியான, தன்னிச்சையான, தற்போக்கிலான
arbitrary in Marathi
- मनमानी
arbitrary in Urdu
- غیرمقید, ترنگی
More languagesFewer languages
- arbitrary in Bengali
- অবাধ, বিধিবহির্ভূত, স্বৈর, ইচ্ছামত
- arbitrary in Malayalam
- ഏകപക്ഷീയ, സ്വേച്ഛാപരമായ, നിരങ്കുശമായ, ചപലമായ
- arbitrary in Kannada
- ಮನಸ್ವೀ, ನಿರಂಕುಶ, ಕ್ರಮವಿಲ್ಲದ, ಕಟ್ಟಳೆಯಿಲ್ಲದ
- arbitrary in Gujarati
- મનસ્વી
- arbitrary in Nepali
- मनमानी
- arbitrary in Tagalog
- alitakdain
- arbitrary in Arabic
- اِعْتِبَاطِيّ iʕtibāṭiyy
- arbitrary in Indonesian
- sembarang, siapa saja, apa saja, mana saja
- arbitrary in Thai
- ดุลยพินิจ dun-là-yá-pí-nít, ตามอำเภอใจ dtaam-am-pəə-jai
Examples of arbitrary in a sentence
- The problem of finding the largest clique in an arbitrary graph is NP-complete.
- This arbitrary convention of dress caused three thousand women to be burned alive.
- We establish this characteristic of concavifiability for continuous functions whose domain is an arbitrary geodesic metric space.
Forms of arbitrary
| Adjective | |
|---|---|
| comparative | more arbitrary |
| superlative | most arbitrary |
| Noun | |
| plural | arbitraries |
Origin of arbitrary
From Middle English arbitrarie, Latin arbitrārius (“arbitrary, uncertain”), from arbiter (“witness, on-looker, listener, judge, overseer”).
Words formed from arbitrary
Phrases with arbitrary
Questions about arbitrary
- What does arbitrary mean?
- Arbitrary means based on individual discretion or judgment; not based on any objective distinction, perhaps even made at random.
- What is arbitrary in Hindi?
- Arbitrary in Hindi is यादृच्छिक (yādŕcchik). See Arbitrary meaning in Hindi.
- What part of speech is arbitrary?
- Arbitrary can be an adjective or a noun.
- How do you pronounce arbitrary?
- Arbitrary is pronounced /ˈɑː.bɪ.tɹə.ɹi/ (UK).
Words near arbitrary in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: arbitrary (page history and authors); arbitrary (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); arbitrary (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); arbitrary (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); arbitrary (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); arbitrary (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); arbitrary (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); arbitrary (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); arbitrary (Nepali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-arbitrary.ogg, en-au-arbitrary.ogg.
Cite this entry: “arbitrary.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/arbitrary. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.