component
Americannoun
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components
plural
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a constituent part; element; ingredient.
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a part of a mechanical or electrical system.
They checked the pads, rotors, and other components of my car's brake system.
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Physics. the projection of a vector quantity, as force or velocity, along an axis.
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Physical Chemistry. one of the set of the minimum number of chemical constituents by which every phase of a given system can be described.
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Mathematics.
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a connected subset of a set, not contained in any other connected subset of the set.
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a coordinate of a vector.
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Linguistics.
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one of the major subdivisions of a generative grammar.
base component;
transformational component;
semantic component;
phonological component.
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a feature determined by componential analysis.
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adjective
noun
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a constituent part or aspect of something more complex
a component of a car
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Also called: element. any electrical device, such as a resistor, that has distinct electrical characteristics and that may be connected to other electrical devices to form a circuit
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maths
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one of a set of two or more vectors whose resultant is a given vector
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the projection of this given vector onto a specified line
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one of the minimum number of chemically distinct constituents necessary to describe fully the composition of each phase in a system See phase rule
adjective
Synonym Usage
See element.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of component
First recorded in 1555–65; from Latin compōnent- (stem of compōnēns, present participle of compōnere “to put together”), equivalent to com- com- + pōn(ere) “to put” + -ent- -ent
Explanation
It's the Ikea curse: You spend four hours figuring out how to piece together your new furniture, only to be left with one random component, or part, that doesn't seem to fit anywhere. It's not surprising that component is related to a Latin word that means "to put together." You simply can't put something together without all of the correct components. Technically speaking, a component is an element of a system or a part of a machine. But a component can also be a factor or ingredient, such as the components of a decision or the components of a really good chocolate cake.
Vocabulary lists containing component
Tier 2 Words for the SBAC ELA Items
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The ACT Math Test: Number and Quantity
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Florida EOC Biology 1
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Chinese component suppliers for Optimus said Tesla recently told them to increase supplies to support a monthly output of 8,000 robots by December.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 19, 2026
We began with the 83 stocks in the S&P 500’s industrial sector and narrowed the group to 44 that have risen at least 10% this year, for the momentum component of the screen.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 19, 2026
The combined field training exercise component of the drills will also be "partially reduced in scale", Seoul said, noting that the "specific details" of that reduction are still under discussion.
From BBC ● Aug. 19, 2026
It’s a component in strength training and vice versa: strength is fundamental for balance, as muscle supports stability and mobility.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 18, 2026
If music is an inborn and biological component, it should be found in infants, as well as in other animal species.
From "Music and the Child" by Natalie Sarrazin
The cranes, which dominate the east Belfast skyline, will have their engines overhauled and other key components replaced.
From BBC ● Aug. 19, 2026
Graphing calculators are no longer the novelty they were roughly half a century ago, and the cost of components like LCD screens and processors has fallen since then.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 18, 2026
There are three components of housing affordability: home prices and appreciation, income growth, and mortgage rates.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 18, 2026
Its major components, including reactor vessel heads, steam generator parts and low-pressure and high-pressure turbines, were all recently updated as part of the 2030 extension, said Maureen Zawalick, chief risk officer at PG&E.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 16, 2026
The components in the making of this film were very significant and intertwined like the main branches on a family tree.
From "The Autobiography of Malcolm X" by Alex Malcolm X;Hailey
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
