category

American  

[kat-i-gawr-ee, -gohr-ee] / ˈkæt ɪˌgɔr i, -ˌgoʊr i /

noun

• categories
  plural

1. any general or comprehensive division; a class.

   Synonyms:

   type, grouping, group

2. a classificatory division in any field of knowledge, as a phylum or any of its subdivisions in biology.

3. Metaphysics.

   1. (in Aristotelian philosophy) any of the fundamental modes of existence, such as substance, quality, and quantity, as determined by analysis of the different possible kinds of predication.

   2. (in Kantian philosophy) any of the fundamental principles of the understanding, as the principle of causation.

   3. any classification of terms that is ultimate and not susceptible to further analysis.

4. Also called Guggenheim.  (used with a singular verb) categories. a game in which a key word and a list of categories, as dogs, automobiles, or rivers, are selected, and in which each player writes down a word in each category that begins with each of the letters of the key word, the player writing down the most words within a time limit being declared the winner.

5. Mathematics. a type of mathematical object, as a set, group, or metric space, together with a set of mappings from such an object to other objects of the same type.

6. Grammar. part of speech.

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category British  

/ ˈkætɪɡərɪ /

noun

1. a class or group of things, people, etc, possessing some quality or qualities in common; a division in a system of classification

2. metaphysics any one of the most basic classes into which objects and concepts can be analysed

3. 1. (in the philosophy of Aristotle) any one of ten most fundamental modes of being, such as quantity, quality, and substance

   2. (in the philosophy of Kant) one of twelve concepts required by human beings to interpret the empirical world

   3. any set of objects, concepts, or expressions distinguished from others within some logical or linguistic theory by the intelligibility of a specific set of statements concerning them See also category mistake

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• categories
  plural

Etymology

Origin of category

First recorded in 1580–90; from Late Latin catēgoria, from Greek katēgoría “accusation” (in logic, “predication”), from katēgoreîn “to accuse, affirm,” from kata- cata- + agoreúein “to speak before the agora ¹ ” + -ia -y ³

Explanation

A category is a group of things that share some commonality. Think of the game show "Jeopardy!," and how each column is a different category of questions — like "Literary Characters" or "Potent Potables." The noun category has the sense of ordering or sorting. In Biology, the science of taxonomy is all about categorizing all living organisms. It might be an easier task to categorize books in a library according to genre (e.g., fiction, non-fiction, mysteries, etc.) or to categorize the shoes in your closet according to season.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

category categories

Yet simply placing someone into an immunosuppressed or healthy category did not reliably predict the outcome.

From Science Daily ● Aug. 21, 2026

This new category of autism was known as Asperger's Syndrome after a little-known paper dating back to Austria in the 1940s, but the term is no longer used.

From BBC ● Aug. 21, 2026

There’s also a hospitality category that outranks all of the others: the Platinum Access packages, which often include luxury accommodations, private suites and private transport.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 20, 2026

Meanwhile, EverBank roughly doubled its loans to nonbank financial institutions, a category that includes much-scrutinized private-credit firms as well as firms such as real-estate investors and insurance companies.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 20, 2026

The only easy-to-find items in this category are Indian Classical music, for example the performances of Ravi Shankar.

From "Understanding Basic Music Theory" by Catherine Schmidt-Jones and Russel Jones

“Ace” is divided into three style categories: the Classics, the Mavericks and the Cool.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 21, 2026

James C. Scott called this legibility, the way institutions flatten complicated people into categories they can manage.

From Slate ● Aug. 21, 2026

However, vaccine outcomes can still vary widely among people who fall into the same general health categories.

From Science Daily ● Aug. 21, 2026

The only two statistical categories in which they had an edge: More penalties and more punts.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 21, 2026

I have the machine sort the figures into two dozen categories.

From "Native Speaker" by Chang-rae Lee

Related Words

• class
• division
• grade
• group
• kind
• league
• level
• list
• rank
• section
• tier