Meaning & use

rigorous

adjective·Academic

Extremely thorough, careful, and exacting; strictly disciplined or demanding.

See it in a sentence

The medication went through rigorous testing before it was approved for public use.

Her rigorous training schedule left little time for anything besides swimming and school.

A note on using this word

Rigorous is common in academic and scientific writing to describe methods or standards applied with great care and precision.

Words with a similar meaning

thoroughstrictexacting

Choose a synonym to suit the sentence. Meanings can overlap without being identical.

Words with an opposite meaning

Make it your own

Write a sentence using “rigorous”, then compare your use with the examples above.

Your draft stays on this page and is not sent anywhere.