meticulous
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meticulous
- /məˈtɪ.kjə.ləs/
Rhymes with -ɪkjələs
Where it comes from
Learned borrowing from Latin meticulōsus (“full of fear, timid, fearful, terrible, frightful”), from metus (“fear”) and -culōsus, extracted from perīculōsus (“perilous”). Sense of “characterized by very precise, conscientious attention to details” is a semantic loan from French méticuleux.
adjective more meticulous · most meticulous
-
Characterized by very precise, conscientious attention to details.
meticulous search
Similar: painstaking, fastidious · Opposite: sloppy, careless, slapdash
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Timid, fearful, overly cautious.
Similar: alert, attentive, careful, cautelous, cautious, canny, chary, circumspect, conservative, deliberate, discreet, guarded · Opposite: aggressive, carefree, careless, cursory, derelict, heedless, irregardless, irrespective, lash, lax, incautious, neglectful
Similar: accurate, careful, surgical, comprehensive, solicitous, conscientious, exhaustive, fastidious, groundly, in-depth, intensive, letter-perfect, mindful, minute, particular, polished, precise, painstaking, punctilious, rigorous, root and branch, scrupulous, scrutinous, sedulous, strict, thorough, tight · Opposite: automatic, careless, cursory, haphazard, perfunctory, slapdash, slipshod, sloppy, superficial, surface-level, token, unthinking, thoughtless
Thesaurus
Closest in meaning: punctilious, fastidious, precise, scrupulous, conscientious, painstaking, thorough, detailed, conscientiously, cautious, earnest, earnestly, in-depth, diligent, careful, rigorous
adjective
Similar: accurate, careful, surgical, comprehensive, solicitous, conscientious, exhaustive, fastidious, groundly, in-depth, intensive, letter-perfect, mindful, minute, particular, polished, precise, painstaking, punctilious, rigorous, root and branch, scrupulous, scrutinous, sedulous, strict, thorough, tight · Opposite: automatic, careless, cursory, haphazard, perfunctory, slapdash, slipshod, sloppy, superficial, surface-level, token, unthinking, thoughtless
Translations
Every language
adj characterized by very precise, conscientious attention to details
| Español | meticuloso, minucioso |
|---|---|
| 日本語 | 細部まで行き届いた saibu made ikitodoita, 几帳面な kichōmen na |
| 中文 | 過細 /过细 guòxì, 細緻 /细致 xìzhì |
| Português | meticuloso |
| Français | méticuleux, soigneux |
| Deutsch | akribisch, peinlich genau, pedantisch, minutiös, minuziös |
| Italiano | meticoloso |
| Ελληνικά | επιμελής epimelís |
| Română | meticulos |
| Русский | скрупулёзный skrupuljóznyj, дото́шный dotóšnyj, педанти́чный pedantíčnyj, тщательный tščatelʹnyj, въедливый vʺjedlivyj, доскональный doskonalʹnyj |
| Tiếng Việt | tỉ mỉ |
adj timid, fearful, overly cautious
| Deutsch | furchtsam, übervorsichtig |
|---|
Talk about this word "meticulous." Wiktionary, via Micwyn, micwyn.com/word/meticulous. Accessed 6 Nov. 2026. meticulous. (n.d.). In Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Retrieved November 6, 2026, from https://micwyn.com/word/meticulous "meticulous." Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Accessed November 6, 2026. https://micwyn.com/word/meticulous.Cite this
@misc{meticulous_2026,
title = {meticulous},
howpublished = {Wiktionary, via Micwyn},
year = {2026},
url = {https://micwyn.com/word/meticulous},
urldate = {2026-11-06}
}
