perfunctory

1. 1.

   hasty and without attention to detail; not thorough

   “a casual (or cursory) inspection failed to reveal the house's structural flaws”

   “a passing glance”

   “perfunctory courtesy”

   “In his paper, he showed a very superficial understanding of psychoanalytic theory”

   Synonymscasualcursorypassingsuperficial

   Similarcareless
2. 2.

   done or produced as a formality only

   “a one-candidate pro forma election”

   Synonymspro forma

   Similarformal

Questions about perfunctory

What does perfunctory mean?

perfunctory means "hasty and without attention to detail; not thorough". That is the primary sense; the word has 2 in total, listed in full on this page.

How many syllables are in perfunctory?

perfunctory has 4 syllables: per-func-to-ry. The stress falls on "func". In IPA it is /pɚˈfʌŋktɚi/.

What is another word for perfunctory?

Close synonyms include casual, cursory, passing, superficial, pro forma. 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.

Is perfunctory a common word?

perfunctory is banded "Rare" — specialist or archaic — most readers will not have met it. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.