significant

From Latin significans, present participle of significare, from signum (“sign”) + ficare (“do, make”), variant of facere.

• (UK) IPA^(key): /sɪɡˈnɪf.ɪ.kənt/
• (US) IPA^(key): /sɪɡˈnɪf.ə.kənt/, /sɪɡˈnɪf.ə.ɡənt/

  • Audio (US):

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significant (comparative more significant, superlative most significant)

1. Signifying something; carrying meaning.

   Synonym: meaningful

   a significant word or sound

   a significant look

   • 1614, Walter Ralegh [i.e., Walter Raleigh], The Historie of the World […], London: […] William Stansby for Walter Burre, […], →OCLC, (please specify |book=1 to 5):

     It was well said of Plotinus, that the stars were significant, but not efficient.

   • 1856, Charles Dickens, Wilkie Collins, chapter III, in The Wreck of the Golden Mary, part two, page 99:

     As evening came on, it grew prematurely dark and cloudy; while the waves acquired that dull indigo tint so significant of ugly weather.

2. Having a noticeable or major effect.

   Synonym: notable

   That was a significant step in the right direction.

   The First World War was a significant event.

   • 2015, Shane R. Reeves, David Wallace, “The Combatant Status of the “Little Green Men” and Other Participants in the Ukraine Conflict”, in International Law Studies, US Naval War College‎^[1], volume 91, number 361, Stockton Center for the Study of International Law, page 393:

     The “little green men”—faces covered, wearing unmarked olive uniforms, speaking Russian and using Russian weapons—have played a significant role in both the occupation of Crimea and the civil war in eastern Ukraine.¹⁹⁶

3. Reasonably large in number or amount.
4. Having a covert or hidden meaning.
5. (statistics) Having a low probability of occurring by chance (for example, having high correlation and thus likely to be related).
6. (mathematics) Of a digit or figure, see significant figure.

Sense 1 (meaningful):

• important

• insignificant
• ignorable
• negligible
• slight

• significance
• significand
• signify

significant (plural significants)

1. That which has significance; a sign; a token; a symbol.
   • 1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Sixt”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act II, scene iv]:

     In dumb significants proclaim your thoughts.

   • a. 1850, William Wordsworth, The Egyptian Maid:

     And in my glass significants there are

• “significant”, in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: G. & C. Merriam, 1913, →OCLC.

significant

1. gerund of significar

significant

1. third-person plural present active indicative of significō