Meaning & use
criticality
Last updated
the quality or state of being crucial, decisive, or of critical importance.
See it in a sentence
The report emphasized the criticality of early diagnosis in treating the disease.
Engineers assessed the criticality of each component before approving the design.
A note on using this word
In nuclear physics, criticality also has a specific technical meaning: the point at which a nuclear reaction becomes self-sustaining.
Words with a similar meaning
importanceurgency
Choose a synonym to suit the sentence. Meanings can overlap without being identical.
Words with an opposite meaning
insignificance
Another way to use it
2. noun
(physics) the state in which a nuclear chain reaction becomes self-sustaining.
Operators carefully monitored the reactor as it approached criticality.
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