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detail.

A part small enough to escape casual notice.

6 characters2 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈdiː.teɪl/UK/ˈdi.teɪl/US/dɪˈteɪl/US, also
  1. A part small enough to escape casual notice.

    countable
    Note this fine detail in the lower left corner.
    We missed several important details in the contract.
  2. A profusion of details.

    uncountable
    This etching is full of fine detail.
  3. The small parts that can escape casual notice.

    uncountable
  4. A part considered trivial enough to ignore.

    countable · uncountable
    I don't concern myself with the details of accounting.
    Safety at work is not a mere detail.
  5. A person's name, address and other personal information.

    countable
    The arresting officer asked the suspect for his details.
  6. A temporary unit or assignment.

    countable · uncountable
  7. An individual feature, fact, or other item, considered separately from the whole of which it is a part.

    countable · uncountable
  8. A narrative which relates minute points; an account which dwells on particulars.

    countable · uncountable
  9. A selected portion of a painting.

    countable · uncountable
Where this word comes from

Borrowed from Middle French détail, from Old French detail, from detaillier, from de- + taillier (“to cut”). Compare typologically Bulgarian подробност (podrobnost), Czech podrobnost, Russian подро́бность (podróbnostʹ) (akin to дроби́ть (drobítʹ)).

verb/dɪˈteɪl/UK/ˈdiː.teɪl/UK/dɪˈteɪl/US/ˈdi.teɪl/US
  1. To explain in detail.

    transitive
    I'll detail the exact procedure to you later.
  2. To clean carefully (particularly of road vehicles, always pronounced /ˈdiːteɪl/)

    transitive
    We need to have the minivan detailed.
  3. To assign to a particular task.

    transitive
Where this word comes from

Borrowed from Middle French détail, from Old French detail, from detaillier, from de- + taillier (“to cut”). Compare typologically Bulgarian подробност (podrobnost), Czech podrobnost, Russian подро́бность (podróbnostʹ) (akin to дроби́ть (drobítʹ)).

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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.