documentary
Americanadjective
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Also documental pertaining to, consisting of, or derived from documents.
a documentary history of France.
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Movies, Television. based on or re-creating an actual event, era, life story, etc., that purports to be factually accurate and contains no fictional elements.
a documentary life of Gandhi.
noun
adjective
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Also: documental. consisting of, derived from, or relating to documents
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presenting factual material with little or no fictional additions
the book gives a documentary account of the war
noun
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of documentary
Explanation
A documentary is a film or video examining an event or person based on facts. The word can also refer to anything involving documents. The idea of documentary as meaning "pertaining to documents" came about at the beginning of the 19th century. Later, it came to mean a factual record of something. On PBS, you'll see lots of documentaries, about everything from baseball to war. Those documentaries are nonfiction films — they're showing true life. However, lots of fictional shows are filmed in a realistic documentary style. If you make a documentary about the U.S. Library of Congress, you'll be documenting lots of historical documents.
Vocabulary lists containing documentary
TEKS ELAR Academic Vocabulary List (5th-7th grades)
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Stargirl
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Academy Awards, 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.
Documentary film maker Dáša Raimanová, 44, said there were moments she thought she'd never see her daughter again but that what they faced was "nothing compared to the people of Palestine".
From BBC • May 24, 2026
The documentary, which is a Danish-Czech production, won the Oscar for the Best Documentary Feature and Bafta award for Best Documentary earlier in 2026.
From BBC • Mar. 26, 2026
Documentary filmmakers are, generally speaking, not the glitziest figures in show business.
From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 10, 2026
Roher, whose "Navalny" scooped Best Documentary Oscar for its poignant telling of the life of late Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny, shifted gears into fiction for "Tuner," starring Dustin Hoffman and Leo Woodall.
From Barron's • Jan. 23, 2026
See also "Relations des Jésuites," and translations of the same in the "Documentary History of New York," vol. i., for a full account of the Onondaga Colony in 1658.
From The Life and Times of Kateri Tekakwitha The Lily of the Mohawks by Walworth, Ellen H.
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.
