didactic
Americanadjective
-
intended for instruction; instructive.
didactic poetry.
-
inclined to teach or lecture others too much.
a boring, didactic speaker.
- Synonyms:
- pedagogical, donnish, preachy, pedantic
-
teaching or intending to teach a moral lesson.
-
(used with a singular verb) didactics, the art or science of teaching.
adjective
-
intended to instruct, esp excessively
-
morally instructive; improving
-
(of works of art or literature) containing a political or moral message to which aesthetic considerations are subordinated
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of didactic
First recorded in 1635–45; from Greek didaktikós “apt at teaching, instructive,” from didakt(ós) “that may be taught, teachable” (from didáskein “to teach”) + -ikos -ic
Explanation
When people are didactic, they're teaching or instructing. This word is often used negatively for when someone is acting too much like a teacher. When you're didactic, you're trying to teach something. Just about everything teachers do is didactic: the same is true of coaches and mentors. Didactic is often used in a negative way. If you heard that a movie is overly didactic, that's probably not good. Most people want to see a story and be entertained when going to the movies, and if it feels like the movie is just telling you what to think, that's didactic in a bad way.
Vocabulary lists containing didactic
The Vocabulary.com Top 1000
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Grade 11, List 1
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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.
“I Swear” is a didactic starting point, and it may even inspire overcorrection when it comes to educating others, but its heart is in the right place.
From Salon ● Apr. 26, 2026
Davis’ book makes sense of all this without being overly didactic.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 13, 2026
Other somewhat more didactic or exposition-heavy passages include a professor giving a brief lecture about the persistent and pernicious British class system.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 2, 2025
The star went on to admit that during that period of time she "might have got a little didactic about it."
From BBC ● Apr. 24, 2025
For the first time in his life, he managed to link those didactic anecdotes with a reality he could see.
From "The House of the Spirits: A Novel" by Isabel Allende
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.
