category
Americannoun
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any general or comprehensive division; a class.
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a classificatory division in any field of knowledge, as a phylum or any of its subdivisions in biology.
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Metaphysics.
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(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.
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(in Kantian philosophy) any of the fundamental principles of the understanding, as the principle of causation.
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any classification of terms that is ultimate and not susceptible to further analysis.
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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.
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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.
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Grammar. part of speech.
noun
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a class or group of things, people, etc, possessing some quality or qualities in common; a division in a system of classification
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metaphysics any one of the most basic classes into which objects and concepts can be analysed
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(in the philosophy of Aristotle) any one of ten most fundamental modes of being, such as quantity, quality, and substance
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(in the philosophy of Kant) one of twelve concepts required by human beings to interpret the empirical world
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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
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.
Vocabulary lists containing category
Jim Burke's Academic Vocabulary List
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Break It Down: Cata
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Academic Vocabulary: Core Tier 2 Words, List 3
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
In putting his money—or lack thereof—where his mouth is, James now belongs to a rare category.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 26, 2026
Prices in the category increased by 5.6% and contributed 0.6 percentage points to the island's annual inflation rate.
From BBC ● Jul. 24, 2026
Since taking the top job at Nike about two years ago, Chief Executive Elliott Hill has been working to pivot the company back to performance footwear, a more durable category than fad-prone lifestyle sneakers.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 24, 2026
"I think it's kind of common sense... it's really important to protect children, and that's little girls who are also involved in that category," she told reporters before a game Wednesday.
From Barron's ● Jul. 23, 2026
So Naomi put the gun in the same category that held Henry’s Bible: things he owned but didn’t use anymore.
From "Out of Darkness" by Ashley Hope Pérez
What sets sex apart from race and other demographic categories is that men and women are dimorphic—their bodies are different in function as well as form.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 24, 2026
"Dairy prices are actually more stable than many other food categories, and more competitive internationally than people often realise," he told the BBC, adding that prices were determined by a number of economic factors.
From BBC ● Jul. 23, 2026
Mr. Burnham’s problems sift into two categories, “U-turn” and “huh?”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 23, 2026
The new price measure will give more weight to gaming and information technology for businesses, two categories that have grown in importance.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 22, 2026
Jefferson’s Anglophobia was more virulent in part because it was more theoretical, a moral conclusion that followed naturally from the moralistic categories he carried around in his head.
From "Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation" by Joseph J. Ellis
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
