incisive
/ɪnˈsaɪ.sɪv/
incisive adjective: intelligently analytical and concise. (of a person or mental process).
Adjective
incisive (comparative more incisive, superlative most incisive)
- Intelligently analytical and concise. (of a person or mental process)
- Quickly proceeding to judgment and forceful in expression. (of an action)
- An incisive producer, who expressed vehement disapproval with my pitch upon my first sentence.
- She was like a Beardsley Salome, he had said. And indeed she had the narrow eyes and the high cheekbone of that creature, and as nearly the sinuosity as is compatible with human symmetry. His wooing had been brief but incisive.1921, Ben Travers, chapter 1, in A Cuckoo in the Nest, Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, Page & Company, published 1925, →OCLC
- Synonyms:
- decisive, forthright
- Having the quality of incising, cutting, or penetrating, as with a sharp instrument; trenchant.
- An incisive, high voice.1862–1863, Mary Ann Evans, Romola
- And her incisive smile accrediting / That treason of false witness in my blush.1856, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, “Second Book”, in Aurora Leigh, London: Chapman and Hall, […], published 1857, →OCLC
- Of or relating to the incisors.
- the incisive bones, the premaxillaries
incisive meaning in Tamil, Bengali, Malayalam and Kannada
incisive in Tamil
- அறிவுக் கூர்மையான, அறிவுக்கூர்மையான, துளைத்துச் செல்கின்ற, துளைத்துச் செல்கிற, நறுக்கும், வெட்டும்
incisive in Bengali
- তীক্ষ্ণ বুদ্ধিদীপ্ত, সরাসরি, মর্মভেদী
incisive in Malayalam
- penetrating, sharp-witted, acute
- മുറിപ്പെടുത്തുന്ന, നിശിത, മൂർച്ചയേറിയ, മൂർച്ചയുള്ള, മൂർത്ത, തുളച്ചുന്നകയറുന്ന
incisive in Kannada
- ಕೊರೆವ, ಹರಿತ, ಕೋರೆ, ಕೂರು, ಚುರುಕು, ಸೀಳಿಕೊಂಡು ಒಳಹೋಗುವ
Examples of incisive in a sentence
- The response, culminating in Rooney finishing off a slick exchange of incisive, pass-them-to-death football, quickly put Scotland back in their place.
- Her idea of wit is nothing more than an incisive observation humorously phrased and delivered with impeccable timing".
- Each successive incisive sentence of his opponent had been like a barbed bandarillo in the flanks of a foaming bull.
Synonyms of incisive
Forms of incisive
| comparative | more incisive |
|---|---|
| superlative | most incisive |
Origin of incisive
Late Middle English (in the sense “cutting, penetrating”), borrowed from Medieval Latin incīsīvus, from incīdō (“to cut in, cut through”) + -īvus (“-ive”, adjectival suffix). Compare Middle French incisif.
Words formed from incisive
Phrases with incisive
Words that rhyme with incisive
Questions about incisive
- What does incisive mean?
- Incisive means intelligently analytical and concise. (of a person or mental process).
- What is incisive in Tamil?
- Incisive in Tamil is அறிவுக் கூர்மையான, அறிவுக்கூர்மையான, துளைத்துச் செல்கின்ற. See Incisive meaning in Tamil.
- What part of speech is incisive?
- Incisive is an adjective.
- How do you pronounce incisive?
- Incisive is pronounced /ɪnˈsaɪ.sɪv/.
Words near incisive in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: incisive (page history and authors); incisive (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); incisive (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); incisive (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); incisive (Kannada Wiktionary) (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.
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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-incisive.wav.
Cite this entry: “incisive.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/incisive. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.