character

Syllables: char·ac·ter, cha·rac·ter/ˈkæɹ(ə)ktɚ/UK/ˈkæ.ɹɪk.tə/

character noun: a being involved in the action of a story; a persona.

Noun

character (countable and uncountable, plural characters)

(countable) A being involved in the action of a story; a persona.
- [I]n a tragedy, or epick poem, the hero of the piece must be advanced foremost to the view of the reader or spectator; he must outshine the rest of all the characters; he must appear the prince of them, like the sun in the Copernican system, encompassed with the less noble planets …1695, John Dryden, A Parallel of Poetry and Painting
- The stories did not seem to me to touch life. […] They left me with the impression of a well-delivered stereopticon lecture, with characters about as life-like as the shadows on the screen, and whisking on and off, at the mercy of the operator.1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter I, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC
(countable) A distinguishing feature; characteristic; trait; nature; phene.
- A single locus governing the petal colour character was detected on the linkage group A2.
- We were not able to ascertain the character of the relationship.
Synonyms:

complexion
A complex of traits marking a person, group, breed, or type.
- A study of the suspect's character and his cast iron alibi ruled him out.
- A man of […] thoroughly subservient character1856, John Lothrop Motley, The Rise of the Dutch Republic. A History. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], →OCLC
(uncountable) Strength of mind; resolution; independence; individuality; moral strength.
- He has a great deal of character.
- "You may not like to eat liver," said Calvin's father, "but it builds character."
(countable) A unique or extraordinary individual; a person characterized by peculiar or notable traits, especially charisma.
- Julius Caesar is a great historical character.
- That bloke is such a character.
(countable) A written or printed symbol, or letter.
- It were much to be wished that there were throughout the world but one sort of character for each letter to express it to the eye.1669, William Holder, Elements of Speech: An Essay of Inquiry into the Natural Production of Letters: […], London: […] T. N[ewcomb] for J[ohn] Martyn printer to the R[oyal] Society, […], →OCLC
(countable, dated) Style of writing or printing; handwriting; the particular form of letters used by a person or people.
- an inscription in the Runic character
- You know the character to be your brother's?c. 1603–1606, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of King Lear”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount...
(countable, dated) A secret cipher; a way of writing in code.
(countable) One of the basic elements making up a text file or string: a code representing a printing character or a control character.
- We'll start at the beginning, with the basic building blocks not just of emoji, nor even digital communication, but of all written language: characters and character sets.2016 November 14, Rob Reed, “Everything You Need To Know About Emoji”, in Smashing Magazine, archived from the original on 12 Feb 2025
(countable, informal) A person or individual, especially one who is unknown.
- We saw a shady character slinking out of the office with some papers.
- That old guy is a real character.
(countable) An assignment of complex numbers to each element of a group, in particular a finite abelian group. More precisely, a group homomorphism into the group of units of a field (usually ℂ).
(countable) Quality, position, rank, or capacity; quality or conduct with respect to a certain office or duty.
- in the miserable character of a slave
- in his character as a magistrate

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(countable, dated) The estimate, individual or general, put upon a person or thing; reputation.
- a man's character for truth and veracity
- Her actions give her a bad character.
(countable, dated) A reference given to a servant, attesting to their behaviour, competence, etc.
(countable, obsolete) Personal appearance.

Verb

character (third-person singular simple present characters, present participle charactering, simple past and past participle charactered)

(obsolete) To write (using characters); to describe.
- O Roſalind, theſe Trees ſhall be my Bookes, / And in their barkes my thoughts Ile charracter, / That euery eye, which in this Forreſt lookes, / Shall ſee thy vertue witneſt euery where.c. 1598–1600 (date written), William Shakespeare, “As You Like It”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount...

character meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Urdu and Bengali

character in Hindi

being in a story: पात्र pātr, पात्री pātrī, चरित्र caritra
distinguishing feature: चरित्र caritra, गुण guṇ
complex of mental and ethical traits marking a person or a group: स्वभाव svabhāv
symbol or letter: अक्षर akṣar

character in Tamil

being in a story: பாத்திரம் pāttiram
complex of mental and ethical traits marking a person or a group: குணம் kuṇam
symbol or letter: எழுத்து eḻuttu
(computing) basic element in a text string: எழுத்துரு eḻutturu

character in Urdu

distinguishing feature: صِفَت sifat
complex of mental and ethical traits marking a person or a group: چال چَلَن cāl calan, خُو xū, کِرْدار kirdār
moral strength: پانی pānī, سیرَت serat

character in Bengali

distinguishing feature: বৈশিষ্ট্য bōiśiśṭṭo
complex of mental and ethical traits marking a person or a group: চরিত্র coritro
symbol or letter: অক্ষর okkhor, হরফ horoph

More languagesFewer languages

character in Telugu: అక్షరము akṣaramu
character in Malayalam: കഥാപാത്രം kathāpātraṁ
character in Kannada: ಅಕ್ಷರ akṣara
character in Punjabi: ਸੀਰਤ sīrat
character in Gujarati: અંધારું andhārũ
character in Odia: ଅକ୍ଷର akṣara
character in Sanskrit: अक्षर akṣara
character in Sinhala: චරිතය caritaya
character in Assamese: চৰিত্ৰ soritro
character in Pashto: کړه kṛë
character in Tagalog: sangkatangian, titik
character in Arabic: شَخْصِيَّة šaḵṣiyya, مِحْرَف miḥraf, خُلْق ḵulq, حَرْف ḥarf
character in Malay: tokoh, aksara
character in Indonesian: tokoh, karakter, ciri-ciri, watak
character in Thai: ตัวละคร dtuua-lá-kɔɔn, อักษร àk-sɔ̌ɔn, อักขระ àk-kà-rà
character in Vietnamese: nhân vật, đặc điểm, chữ, kí tự
character in Myanmar: အက္ခရာ akhka.ra

Examples of character in a sentence

But Pirates! comes with all the usual Aardman strengths intact, particularly the sense that its characters and creators alike are too good-hearted and sweet to nitpick.2012 April 26, Tasha Robinson, “Film: Reviews: The Pirates! Band Of Misfits”, in The Onion AV Club, archived from the original on 29 Apr...
Now all this was very fine, but not at all in keeping with the Celebrity's character as I had come to conceive it.1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter III, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company...
The North Staffordshire was always a railway of character from its formation in 1845, and the Railway Member identified with it from the start was also a character.1960 March, N. Caplan, “The Railway Member of Parliament”, in Railway Magazine, page 209:
You two characters are going to Top Gun.1986, Jim Cash; Jack Epps, Jr.; Ehud Yonay, Top Gun, California: Paramount Pictures:

All 40 example sentences with character

Synonyms of character

complexion

Forms of character

Noun
plural	characters
Verb
third-person singular present	characters
present participle	charactering
past participle	charactered
past	charactered

Plural of character: characters

Origin of character

From Middle English caracter, from Old French caractere, from Latin character, from Ancient Greek χαρακτήρ (kharaktḗr, “type, nature, character”), from χαράσσω (kharássō, “to engrave”). Displaced native English thew from Old English þēaw (in the plural) and Old English hād (“person, character”). Doublet of charakter.

Words formed from character

Phrases with character

66 more phrasesFewer phrases

Questions about character

What does character mean?: Character means a being involved in the action of a story; a persona.
What is character in Hindi?: Character in Hindi is पात्र (pātr), पात्री (pātrī), चरित्र (caritra). See Character meaning in Hindi.
How do you use character in a sentence?: But Pirates! comes with all the usual Aardman strengths intact, particularly the sense that its characters and creators alike are too good-hearted and sweet to nitpick.
What part of speech is character?: Character can be a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce character?: Character is pronounced /ˈkæ.ɹɪk.tə/ (UK).
What is the plural of character?: The plural of character is characters.

Words near character in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: character (page history and authors); ਸੀਰਤ (Punjabi) (page history and authors); ଅକ୍ଷର (Odia) (page history and authors); චරිතය (Sinhala) (page history and authors); চৰিত্ৰ (Assamese) (page history and authors); کړه (Pashto) (page history and authors). 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.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-character.ogg.

Cite this entry: “character.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/character. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.