Word.ws English Dictionary

matric

/məˈtɹɪk/

More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations

General South African/ˈmeɪtɹɪk/

matric noun: the final year of high school. Also the alternative letter-case form of Matric.

Noun (1)

matric (countable and uncountable, plural matrics)

  1. (South Africa) The final year of high school.
  2. (South Africa) Someone in their final year of high school.
    • Once, when some money disappeared […], it was Ben who took the cleaner under his wing and instituted inquiries which revealed a group of matric boys to be the culprits.1979, André Brink, A Dry White Season, Vintage, published 1998, page 37
    Synonyms:
    senior

Adjective

matric (not comparable)

  1. Of or pertaining to matrices.
    • But throughout this book we look upon the matric algebras as our primary object;1939, Hermann Weyl, “Chapter 3: Matric algebras and group rings”, in The Classical Groups: Their Invariants and Representations
    • […] the possibility of using matric methods to solve analysis and synthesis problems becomes apparent.1956, R. J. Kavanagh, “The application of matrix methods to multi-variable control systems”, in Journal of the Franklin Institute, volume 262

Noun (2) capitalized: Matric

Matric (uncountable)

  1. (Ireland, historical, informal) The Matriculation Examination of the National University of Ireland (last held in 1992)
    • Entrance […] is on the basis of the Matriculation Examination (Matric) of the National University of Ireland (N.U.I.) held in June and September each year. […] Passes in the Leaving Certificate (L. C.) in the requisite subjects, or in the General Certificate of Education, Northern Ireland, are...1964 Winter, J. P. MacHale, “Selection for Degree Purposes in U.C.D.”, in Studies: An Irish Quarterly Review, volume 53, number 212, page 390
    • As well as me failing the Matric, my lack of sophistication was the despair of my mother.1985, Mary Rose Callaghan, Confessions of a prodigal daughter, London: M. Boyars, →ISBN, page 28

Also used as

matric is also the alternative letter-case form of Matric.

Synonyms of matric

Forms of matric

pluralmatrics
alternative formmatric

Origin of matric

From matriculation.

From matrix.

Questions about matric

What does matric mean?
Matric means the final year of high school.
What part of speech is matric?
Matric can be a noun or an adjective.
How do you pronounce matric?
Matric is pronounced /məˈtɹɪk/ (UK).
What is the plural of matric?
The plural of matric is matrics.

Words near matric in the dictionary

  1. matriarchism
  2. matriarchist
  3. matriarchists
  4. matriarchs
  5. matriarchy
  6. matric
  7. matrical
  8. matrically
  9. matricaria
  10. matricarias
  11. matricary

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: matric (page history and authors); Matric (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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Cite this entry: “matric.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/matric. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.