operational
/ˌɒp.əˈɹeɪ.ʃə.nəl/US/ˌɑ.pəˈɹeɪ.ʃə.nəl/
operational adjective: of or relating to operations, especially military operations.
Adjective
operational (comparative more operational, superlative most operational)
- Of or relating to operations, especially military operations.
- Private-equity nabobs bristle at being dubbed mere financiers.[…]Much of their pleading is public-relations bluster. Clever financial ploys are what have made billionaires of the industry’s veterans. “Operational improvement” in a portfolio company has often meant little more than promising...2013 June 22, “Engineers of a different kind”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8841, page 70
- Functioning and ready for use.
- Princess Leia, before your execution, you will join me at a ceremony that will make this battle station operational. No star system will dare oppose the Emperor now.1977, George Lucas, Governor Tarkin, Star Wars
- Despite somewhat faded paintwork, 87017 Iron Duke is clearly very much operational, as confirmed here on September 4.2022 December 14, “News in pictures: Class 87 soldiers on in Bulgaria”, in RAIL, number 972, page 26, photo caption
- Effective or operative.
- Determined by means of practical measures.
operational meaning in Hindi, Bengali, Malayalam and Kannada
operational in Hindi
- functioning and ready for use
- क्रियाशील kriyāśīl
- effective or operative
- क्रियाशील kriyāśīl
operational in Bengali
- কার্যকর, চালনাযোগ্য
operational in Malayalam
- working, (up and) running, functioning
- പ്രവർത്തിക്കുന്ന, ഓടുന്ന, ധർമ്മം നിർവ്വഹിക്കുന്ന, പ്രവർത്തനശക്തി യുള്ള, പ്രവർത്തനിരതമായ, പ്രവർത്തിച്ചു കൊണ്ടിരിക്കുന്ന
operational in Kannada
- ಕಾರ್ಯಮಾಡಬಲ್ಲ, ಕಾರ್ಯ ಸಮರ್ಥ, ಕಾರ್ಯಕಾರಿ, ಕಾರ್ಯಸಿದ್ಧ
More languagesFewer languages
- operational in Indonesian
- operasional
- operational in Persian
- عملیاتی 'amaliyâti
Examples of operational in a sentence
- Flexibility is good, but a tolerance for mediocrity carried far enough impairs operational capacity.
- The operational definition of a well-behaved student might be set at the threshold of "no more than 2 detentions in each semester".
- Finally, there's also operational damage through impact energy from wheels hitting the rail.
Forms of operational
| comparative | more operational |
|---|---|
| superlative | most operational |
Origin of operational
From operation + -al.
Words formed from operational
- inoperational
- intraoperational
- nonoperational
- non-operational
- operational analysis
- operational calculus
- operational definition
- operational encirclement
- operational exhaustion
- operational fatigue
- operationalise
- operationalism
- operationalist
- operationalistic
- operationality
- operationalize
- operationally
- operational research
- operational service period
- operational taxonomic unit
- oplan
- postoperational
- preoperational
- pre-operational
- teleoperational
Phrases with operational
Questions about operational
- What does operational mean?
- Operational means of or relating to operations, especially military operations.
- What is operational in Hindi?
- Operational in Hindi is क्रियाशील (kriyāśīl). See Operational meaning in Hindi.
- What part of speech is operational?
- Operational is an adjective.
- How do you pronounce operational?
- Operational is pronounced /ˌɒp.əˈɹeɪ.ʃə.nəl/ (UK).
Words near operational in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: operational (page history and authors); Operational (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); operational (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset and license); operational (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)-Back ache-operational.wav.
Cite this entry: “operational.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/operational. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.