quality

Noun

quality (countable and uncountable, plural qualities)

1. (countable) The kind, condition, and/or the set of characteristics of something, as opposed to the quantity of something.
   • The lattice structure of a steel profoundly changes its qualities.
   • Tuc[ca]. […] Can thy Author doe it impudently enough? / Hiſt[rio]. O, I warrant you, Captaine: and ſpitefully inough too; he ha's one of the moſt ouerflowing villanous wits, in Rome. He will ſlander any man that breathes; If he diſguſt him. / Tucca. I'le know the poor, egregious, nitty Raſcall; and...1601, Ben Jonson, Poetaster or The Arraignment: […], London: […] [R. Bradock] for M[atthew] L[ownes] […], published 1602, →OCLC, Act III
2. (countable) A single trait.
   • While being impulsive can be great for artists, it is not a desirable quality for engineers.
   • Security, stability, and efficiency are good qualities of an operating system.
3. (uncountable) Good characteristics in particular; level of excellence; freedom of faults and flaws.
   • This school is well-known for having teachers of high quality.
   • Quality of life is usually determined by health, education, and income.

   Synonyms:

   duty

4. (attributive, occasionally proscribed) Good worth, good make.
   • For this building project we need to use quality materials that will last for many decades.
   • That was a quality game by Jim Smith.
5. (archaic) Position; status; rank.
   • The firſt Solemn Embaſſy that the French King ſent to the late King of SIAM, was in the Year 1685, by Monſieur de Chaumont, who went in Quality of Ambaſſador Extraordinary […]1690, “The Preface to the Reader”, in A Full and True Relation of the Great and Wonderful Revolution That Hapned Lately in the Kingdom of Siam in the East-Indies, London: Randal Taylor, page i
6. (archaic) High social position. (See also the quality.)
   • A peasant is not allowed to fall in love with a lady of quality.
   • Membership of this golf club is limited to those of quality and wealth.
7. In a two-phase liquid–vapor mixture, the ratio of the mass of vapor present to the total mass of the mixture.
8. (countable) The third step in OPQRST where the responder investigates what the NOI/MOI feels like.
   • To identify quality try asking, "what does it feel like?".
9. (UK, countable) A newspaper with relatively serious, high-quality content.
   • It is argued that in the last ten years or so, quality broadsheet newspapers have become more like the tabloids. Anthony Sampson has argued that 'the frontier between the qualities and popular papers has virtually disappeared'.1998, Bill Coxall, Lynton Robins, Robert Leach, Contemporary British Politics, page 164