defective
UK/dɪˈfɛktɪv/
defective adjective: having one or more defects.
Adjective
defective (comparative more defective, superlative most defective)
- Having one or more defects.
- If the workmanship is defective, they'll replace the shoes with a new pair.
- Artillery officers sometimes have defective hearing.
- Synonyms:
- faulty
- Antonyms:
- complete, perfect, undefective
- Lacking some forms; e.g., having only one tense or being usable only in the third person.
- Having a root whose final consonant is weak (ي, و, or ء).
- Not capable of representing all the phonemic distinctions of a language it is used to write.
- Spelled without matres lectionis, for example אמץ (ómets, “courage”) as opposed to the plene spelling אומץ where the letter vav ⟨ו⟩ indicates the vowel o.
- Antonyms:
- plene
Adverb
defective (not comparable)
- Without matres lectionis (letters indicating vowels) written out.
- For the sake of comparison, note the distribution of these spellings in some other Hebrew sources: in the MT the vowel o after the first consonant of the root is written defective in approximately 3,600 cases as against 850 cases of plene spelling.2013, Gregor Geiger, Plene Writing of the Qōṭēl Pattern in the Dead Sea Scrolls
- Antonyms:
- plene
Noun
defective (plural defectives)
- A person or thing considered to be defective.
- It is an offence, subject to the exception mentioned in this section, for a person to procure a woman who is a defective to have unlawful sexual intercourse in any part of the world.1956, Parliament of the United Kingdom, “Part I, section 9(1)”, in Sexual Offences Act 1956, page 3
- There were many more kinds of mental institutions at mid-century, ones for "mental defectives and epileptics" and the mentally retarded, psychiatric wards in veterans hospitals, as well as "psychopathic" and private mental hospitals.2007 January 15, Bernard E. Harcourt, “The Mentally Ill, Behind Bars”, in New York Times
- A word written without matres lectionis (letters indicating vowels).
- Thus, in the Pentateuch and in the earlier prophets the plenes are counted, whilst in the later prophets the defectives are enumerated.2011, Christian D. Ginsburg, Jacob Ben Chajim Ibn Adonijah's Introduction to the Rabbinic Bible: Hebrew and English with Explanatory Notes
- Antonyms:
- plene
defective meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu
defective in Hindi
- दोषपूर्ण
defective in Tamil
- குறையுள்ள, குற்றப்பாடு, குறபட்ட
defective in Marathi
- defective, impaired, or affected by a disorder, deformity, or malfunction
- विकृत vikrut
defective in Urdu
- عیب دار, کچا, کم, خراب, کھوٹا, ناقص
More languagesFewer languages
- defective in Bengali
- ত্রুটিযুক্ত
- defective in Malayalam
- കുറവുള്ള, ന്യൂനതയുള്ള
- defective in Kannada
- ಬುದ್ಧಿವಿಕಲ, ಮನೋವಿಕಲ, ಅಂಗವಿಕಲ
- defective in Punjabi
- ਨੁਕਸਦਾਰ
- defective in Odia
- ଖଣ୍ଡ khaṇḍa
- defective in Sanskrit
- ऊन ūná, हत hatá
- defective in Nepali
- दोषपूर्ण
- defective in Tagalog
- depektibo, depektuwoso
- defective in Arabic
- معيب maʕīb, نَاقِص nāqiṣ
Examples of defective in a sentence
- The verb can is defective in most English dialects, as it lacks an infinitive.
- The company scrimped on the design so badly that it ended up defective.
- I'll see your defective gallbladder and raise you one heart murmur and a kidney stone.
Synonyms of defective
Antonyms
Forms of defective
| Adjective | |
|---|---|
| comparative | more defective |
| superlative | most defective |
| Noun | |
| plural | defectives |
Origin of defective
From Middle English defectif, defective, from Old French defectif, from Late Latin dēfectīvus.
Words formed from defective
Phrases with defective
Words that rhyme with defective
- projective
- subjective
- effective
- objective
- prospective
- reflective
- collective
- connective
- directive
- respective
- selective
- injective
28 more rhymesFewer rhymes
- detective
- elective
- irrespective
- perfective
- retrospective
- affective
- bijective
- corrective
- erective
- ineffective
- inflective
- intellective
- intersubjective
- protective
- refective
- advective
- convective
- deflective
- ejective
- imperfective
- infective
- inspective
- introspective
- overprotective
- rejective
- surjective
- unreflective
- unselective
Questions about defective
- What does defective mean?
- Defective means having one or more defects.
- What is defective in Hindi?
- Defective in Hindi is दोषपूर्ण. See Defective meaning in Hindi.
- What part of speech is defective?
- Defective can be an adjective, an adverb or a noun.
- How do you pronounce defective?
- Defective is pronounced /dɪˈfɛktɪv/ (UK).
Words near defective in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: defective (page history and authors); defective (Hindi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); defective (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); विकृत (Marathi) (page history and authors); defective (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); defective (Bengali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); defective (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); defective (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); defective (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); ଖଣ୍ଡ (Odia) (page history and authors); ऊन (Sanskrit) (page history and authors); defective (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.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-defective.ogg.
Cite this entry: “defective.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/defective. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.