notional
Americanadjective
-
pertaining to or expressing a notion or idea.
-
of the nature of a notion or idea.
a notional response to the question.
-
abstract, theoretical, or speculative, as reflective thought.
-
not real or actual; ideal or imaginary.
to create a notional world for oneself.
-
given to or full of foolish or fanciful ideas or moods.
-
Grammar.
-
relating to the meaning expressed by a linguistic form.
-
having full lexical meaning, in contrast to relational.
-
-
Semantics. belonging to a class of words that express clear concepts rather than relations between concepts; presentive.
adjective
-
relating to, expressing, or consisting of notions or ideas
-
not evident in reality; hypothetical or imaginary
a notional tax credit
-
characteristic of a notion or concept, esp in being speculative or imaginary; abstract
-
grammar
-
(of a word) having lexical meaning
-
another word for semantic
-
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of notional
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.
Long notional exposure on the Russell 2000 is at a three-year high, and Chew points out that the average long position has an unrealized gain of 2.5% at present.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 18, 2026
England began a baking final day with scant hope of an escape, resuming on 182-5, chasing a notional 463.
From BBC ● Jun. 21, 2026
U.S. notional volume of levered ETFs is about $90 billion, up from almost nothing a decade ago, per Goldman Sachs data.
From Barron's ● Jun. 17, 2026
JPMorgan’s markets unit, a major QIS provider, manages over $100 billion in notional exposure, with QIS revenue up 30% this year from the same period in 2025.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 21, 2026
In order to give particles any mass at all we have to introduce the notional Higgs boson; whether it actually exists is a matter for twenty-first-century physics.
From "A Short History of Nearly Everything" by Bill Bryson
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.
