basic

1. 1.

   pertaining to or constituting a base or basis

   “a basic fact”

   “the basic ingredients”

   “basic changes in public opinion occur because of changes in priorities”

   Antonymsincidental

   Similarbasalelementaryfundamentalgrassrootsradical
2. 2.

   reduced to the simplest and most significant form possible without loss of generality

   “a basic story line”

   “a canonical syllable pattern”

   Synonymscanoniccanonical

   Similarstandard
3. 3.

   serving as a base or starting point

   “a basic course in Russian”

   “basic training for raw recruits”

   “a set of basic tools”

   “an introductory art course”

   Synonymsintroductory

   Similarfirst
4. 4.

   of or denoting or of the nature of or containing a base

   Similaralkaline

   chemistry

1. 1.

   a popular programming language that is relatively easy to learn; an acronym for beginner's all-purpose symbolic instruction code; no longer in general use

   Broaderprogramming language
2. 2.

   (usually in the plural) a necessary commodity for which demand is constant

   Synonymsstaple

   Broadercommodity

   plural

Other forms of basic

plural

basics·

comparative

basicer·

superlative

basicest·

Forms marked · are formed by the regular rule rather than recorded in the source data. English keeps a few hundred irregulars and the rest follow the pattern, so the rule is right far more often than not — but it is a rule, and the mark says so.

Questions about basic

What does basic mean?

basic means "pertaining to or constituting a base or basis". That is the primary sense; the word has 6 in total, listed in full on this page.

How many syllables are in basic?

basic has 2 syllables: ba-sic. The stress falls on "ba". In IPA it is /ˈbeɪsɪk/.

What is another word for basic?

Close synonyms include canonic, canonical, introductory, staple. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

What is the opposite of basic?

The recorded antonyms are incidental.

Is basic a common word?

basic is banded "Common" — everyday vocabulary in speech and writing. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.