Practical

How to spell practical

9 letters · 3 syllables

How to pronounce practical

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does practical mean?

1. adjectiveConcerned with actual use or action rather than theory, and effective in real situations.

Practical in a sentence

• The workshop offered practical advice on managing a household budget.

• A sturdy backpack is far more practical than a fragile designer bag for daily commuting.

Where does practical come from?

Language of origin: Greek

This word descends from the Greek praktikos, meaning 'fit for doing' or 'concerned with action', which was built on the verb prattein 'to do' or 'to accomplish'. Latin took it up as practicus, and Old French passed along a related form before English settled on the modern shape in the late 1400s. The original idea was a sharp contrast with the purely theoretical: something practical was actually carried out rather than merely thought about. The same prattein root sits inside everyday relatives such as 'practice', 'practise', and 'pragmatic', which all turn on the notion of doing rather than speculating. The spelling trap is the unstressed ending, since writers sometimes drift toward '-cle' or '-cal' uncertainty, but it always closes with -ical here.

How the word is built

• practic- (from Greek praktikos: fit for action, concerned with doing)
• -al (adjective suffix)