adj, noun, slang ·Moderate ·High school level

Definitions

Noun

1. 1
   Something preliminary, such as a trial, report, race, etc. informal
2. 2
   an examination taken by graduate students to determine their fitness to continue wordnet
3. 3
   Clipping of preliminary examination; a type of exam sat at the end of the first year of most undergraduate degrees. abbreviation, alt-of, clipping, informal, plural-normally
4. 4
   a minor match preceding the main event wordnet
5. 5
   The preliminary front matter of a book; all content preceding the main text or work itself. in-plural

Adjective

1. 1
   Preliminary. informal, not-comparable

Synonyms

All synonyms

auditionblue bookexamexaminationfinalhearing

Etymology

Clipping of preliminary. Sense 2 ("clipping of preliminary examination") was originally Oxford University slang, now in common use.

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.