distinctive

American  

[dih-stingk-tiv] / dɪˈstɪŋk tɪv /

adjective

1. serving to distinguish; characteristic; distinguishing: distinguishing.

   the distinctive stripes of the zebra.

   Synonyms:

   individual

2. having a special quality, style, attractiveness, etc.; notable.

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distinctive British  

/ dɪˈstɪŋktɪv /

adjective

1. serving or tending to distinguish

2. denoting one of a set of minimal features of a phoneme in a given language that serve to distinguish it from other phonemes. The distinctive features of /p/ in English are that it is voiceless, bilabial, non-nasal, and plosive; /b/ is voiced, bilabial, non-nasal, and plosive: the two differ by the distinctive feature of voice

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Other Word Forms

• distinctively adverb
• distinctiveness noun
• subdistinctive adjective
• subdistinctively adverb
• subdistinctiveness noun

Etymology

Origin of distinctive

First recorded in 1575–85; from Medieval Latin distinctīvus; equivalent to distinct + -ive

Example Sentences

An ad in the San Francisco Examiner declared that “we have spared nothing to create a distinctive store of which we feel all San Francisco may well be proud.”

From The Wall Street Journal

By endeavoring to tell the entire history of art, as far as their collections allow, they sometimes underplay a concentration within their holdings that makes them distinctive.

From The Wall Street Journal

Radio 4 controller said Rajan had "brought a distinctive intellectual energy and curiosity to Today that we will be really sad to lose".

From BBC

Scotland has its own income tax system, which has moved in a distinctive direction with six different bands ranging from 19% to 48%.

From BBC

Ms. Snider’s distinctive compositional voice finds the otherworldly in the day-to-day.

From The Wall Street Journal

Related Words

• cool
• extraordinary
• idiosyncratic
• offbeat
• original
• peculiar
• singular
• special
• weird