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theoretical

adjectiveattested in dialogue

  • United Kingdom//ˌθɪəˈɹɛtɪkəl//
  • United Kingdom/[ˌθɪə̯ˈɹɛt.ɪ.kl̩]/
  • United States//ˌθi.əˈɹɛt.ɪ.kəl//
  • United States/[ˌθi.əˈɹɛɾ.ɪ.kl̩]/
  • Australia//ˌθiːˈɹet.ɪ.kəl//

Of or relating to theory; abstract; not empirical.

adjective

  1. 1

    Of or relating to theory; abstract; not empirical.

    We may look upon this figure as representing in section a theoretical wing-form, or aerofoil

    Which makes the concept known as Rods From God the ultimate form of kinetic weaponry. This theoretical weapon would drop telephone pole sized rods of dense tungsten from a satellite in orbit.

Etymology

From Middle English theorothycall, probably from Latin theōrēticus + -al, from Ancient Greek θεωρητικός (theōrētikós).

Forms

comparative
more theoretical
superlative
most theoretical
The neighbouring pagesAlphabetical order follows the rules of the language, not byte values: an accent decides only between two otherwise identical words, and Spanish files Ñ as a letter of its own.

Lexical content from Wiktionary, under CC BY-SA 4.0 · Source entry · Data version 2026-08-23

Rank among the words of the OpenSubtitles 2018 corpus — film and television subtitles, so spoken rather than written usage (CC BY-SA 3.0).