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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

preference.

The selection of one thing or person over others (with the main adposition being "for" in relation to the thing or person, but possibly also "of")

10 characters3 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈpɹɛf(ə)ɹ(ə)ns//ˈpɹɛf(ə)ɹɛns/

  1. The selection of one thing or person over others (with the main adposition being "for" in relation to the thing or person, but possibly also "of")

    countable · uncountable
    He has a preference for crisp wines.

  2. The option to so select, and the one selected.

    countable · uncountable
    Can I keep my preferences when I upgrade to the new version of this application?

  3. The state of being preferred over others.

    countable · uncountable

  4. A strong liking or personal valuation.

    countable · uncountable

  5. A preferential bias; partiality; discrimination.

    countable · uncountable
Where this word comes from

From Middle French preference, from Medieval Latin preferentia. Doublet of preferans. Morphologically prefer + -ence. Compare typologically Russian предвзя́тость (predvzjátostʹ) (<< взять (vzjatʹ), a suppletive of брать (bratʹ), which is cognate with Latin ferō).

verb/ˈpɹɛf(ə)ɹ(ə)ns//ˈpɹɛf(ə)ɹɛns/

  1. To give preferential treatment to; to give a preference to.

    US
Where this word comes from

From Middle French preference, from Medieval Latin preferentia. Doublet of preferans. Morphologically prefer + -ence. Compare typologically Russian предвзя́тость (predvzjátostʹ) (<< взять (vzjatʹ), a suppletive of брать (bratʹ), which is cognate with Latin ferō).

noun

  1. Preferans, a card game, principally played in Eastern Europe.

    uncountable
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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.