delicate.
Easily damaged or requiring careful handling.
Meaning & usage
Easily damaged or requiring careful handling.
Those clothes are made from delicate lace.
The negotiations were very delicate.
Characterized by a fine structure or thin lines.
Her face was delicate.
The spider wove a delicate web.
Intended for use with fragile items.
Set the washing machine to the delicate cycle.
Refined; gentle; scrupulous not to trespass or offend; considerate; said of manners, conduct, or feelings.
delicate behaviour
delicate attentions
Of weak health; easily sick; unable to endure hardship.
a delicate child
delicate health
Unwell, especially because of having drunk too much alcohol.
Please don't speak so loudly: I'm feeling a bit delicate this morning.
Addicted to pleasure; luxurious; voluptuous; alluring.
Pleasing to the senses; refined; adapted to please an elegant or cultivated taste.
a delicate dish
delicate flavour
Slight and shapely; lovely; graceful.
Light, or softly tinted; said of a colour.
a delicate shade of blue
Of exacting tastes and habits; dainty; fastidious.
Highly discriminating or perceptive; refinedly critical; sensitive; exquisite.
a delicate taste
a delicate ear for music
Affected by slight causes; showing slight changes.
a delicate thermometer
Where this word comes from
From Middle English delicat, from Latin dēlicātus (“giving pleasure, delightful, soft, luxurious, delicate, (in Medieval Latin also) fine, slender”), from dēlicia + -ātus (see -ate (adjective-forming suffix)), usually in plural dēliciae (“pleasure, delight, luxury”), from dēliciō (“to allure, entice”), from dē- (“away”) + laciō (“to lure, to deceive”), from Proto-Italic *lakjō (“to draw, pull”), of unknown ultimate origin. Compare delight, delicious and Spanish delgado (“thin, skinny”). The noun is from a substantivization of the adjective (see -ate).
A delicate item of clothing, especially underwear or lingerie.
Don't put that in with your jeans: it's a delicate!
A choice dainty; a delicacy.
A delicate, luxurious, or effeminate person.
A moth of the species Mythimna vitellina.
Where this word comes from
From Middle English delicat, from Latin dēlicātus (“giving pleasure, delightful, soft, luxurious, delicate, (in Medieval Latin also) fine, slender”), from dēlicia + -ātus (see -ate (adjective-forming suffix)), usually in plural dēliciae (“pleasure, delight, luxury”), from dēliciō (“to allure, entice”), from dē- (“away”) + laciō (“to lure, to deceive”), from Proto-Italic *lakjō (“to draw, pull”), of unknown ultimate origin. Compare delight, delicious and Spanish delgado (“thin, skinny”). The noun is from a substantivization of the adjective (see -ate).
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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.
Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.