practice
- habitual or customary performance; operation: office practice.
- habit; custom: It is not the practice here for men to wear long hair.
- repeated performance or systematic exercise for the purpose of acquiring skill or proficiency: Practice makes perfect.
- condition arrived at by experience or exercise: She refused to play the piano, because she was out of practice.
- the action or process of performing or doing something: to put a scheme into practice; the shameful practices of a blackmailer.
- the exercise or pursuit of a profession or occupation, especially law or medicine: She plans to set up practice in her hometown.
- the business of a professional person: The doctor wanted his daughter to take over his practice when he retired.
- Law. the established method of conducting legal proceedings.
- Archaic. plotting; intrigue; trickery.
- Usually practices. Archaic. intrigues; plots.
- to perform or do habitually or usually: to practice a strict regimen.
- to follow or observe habitually or customarily: to practice one's religion.
- to exercise or pursue as a profession, art, or occupation: to practice law.
- to perform or do repeatedly in order to acquire skill or proficiency: to practice the violin.
- to train or drill (a person, animal, etc.) in something in order to give proficiency.
- to do something habitually or as a practice.
- to pursue a profession, especially law or medicine.
- to exercise oneself by repeated performance in order to acquire skill: to practice at shooting.
- Archaic. to plot or conspire.
Origin of practice
Synonyms for practice
See more synonyms for on Thesaurus.comSynonym study
Related Words for practice
use, proceeding, form, habit, process, system, rule, method, tradition, discipline, training, study, experience, preparation, drill, action, operation, career, work, honeExamples from the Web for practice
Contemporary Examples of practice
As a means of preventing tooth decay in those cities that do fluoridate, the practice certainly looks like a success.
The men use the dolls to practice the basics of caring for babies.
DeCrow would come to lead a movement against this practice, suing the Hotel Syracuse in 1969 and calling for protests and sit-ins.
The WHO has agreed to meet with Yang and a number of Chinese NGOs to discuss a broader ruling on the practice.
This story was used by some third-century North African Christians to justify the practice of women performing baptisms.
Historical Examples of practice
I ought to be supple enough after the practice of these three days.
The Armourer's PrenticesCharlotte M. Yonge
You are recommended, Miss, to the practice of your private devotions.
Clarissa, Volume 1 (of 9)Samuel Richardson
The designs of that power, dark in purpose, are clear in practice.
However good they may be, we are not ready to put them into practice.
The Conquest of FearBasil King
The method of working with it was simple in idea, however difficult in practice.
The Conquest of FearBasil King
practice
- a usual or customary action or proceedingit was his practice to rise at six; he made a practice of stealing stamps
- repetition or exercise of an activity in order to achieve mastery and fluency
- the condition of having mastery of a skill or activity through repetition (esp in the phrases in practice, out of practice)
- the exercise of a professionhe set up practice as a lawyer
- the act of doing somethinghe put his plans into practice
- the established method of conducting proceedings in a court of law
- the US spelling of practise
Word Origin for practice
Word Origin and History for practice
c.1400, "to do, act;" early 15c., "to follow or employ; to carry on a profession," especially medicine, from Old French pratiser, practiser "to practice," alteration of practiquer, from Medieval Latin practicare "to do, perform, practice," from Late Latin practicus "practical," from Greek praktikos "practical" (see practical).
From early 15c. as "to perform repeatedly to acquire skill, to learn by repeated performance;" mid-15c. as "to perform, to work at, exercise." Related: Practiced; practicing.
early 15c., practise, "practical application," originally especially of medicine but also alchemy, education, etc.; from Old French pratiser, from Medieval Latin practicare (see practice (v.)). From early 15c. often assimilated in spelling to nouns in -ice. Also as practic, which survived in parallel into 19c.
practice
(prăk′tĭs)- To engage in the profession of medicine or one of the allied health professions.
- The exercise of the profession of medicine.
- The business of a practicing physician or group of physicians, including facilities and customary patients.
Idioms and Phrases with practice
practice
In addition to the idioms beginning with practice
- practice makes perfect
- practice what you preach
also see:
- in practice
- make a practice of
- out of practice
- put into practice
- sharp practice