precautionary

1. 1.

   taken in advance to protect against possible danger or failure

   “gave precautionary advice”

   “I would take precautionary steps to keep him away”

   Synonymsprecautional

   Similarpreventive

Questions about precautionary

What does precautionary mean?

precautionary means "taken in advance to protect against possible danger or failure".

How many syllables are in precautionary?

precautionary has 5 syllables: pre-cau-tio-na-ry. The stress falls on "cau". In IPA it is /pɹɪˈkɔʃənɛɹi/.

What is another word for precautionary?

Close synonyms include precautional. 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 precautionary a common word?

precautionary is banded "Uncommon" — turns up in careful writing rather than conversation. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.