wild-card

W w

Transcription

- US Pronunciation
- US IPA
- [wahyld kahrd]
- /waɪld kɑrd/

- US Pronunciation
- US IPA
- [wahyld kahrd]
- /waɪld kɑrd/

Definitions of wild-card word

adjective wild-card of, constituting, or including a wild card. 1
adjective wild-card Informal. of, being, or including an unpredictable or unproven element, person, item, etc. 1
adjective wild-card Sports. of, being, or including an unseeded or unproven participant or team, as a team in a championship tournament that has not placed first in its league or area. 1
noun wild-card Cards. a card having its value decided by the wishes of the players. 1
noun wild-card a determining or important person or thing whose qualities are unknown, indeterminate, or unpredictable: In a sailboat race the weather is the wild card. 1
noun wild-card Tennis. a player, usually without ranking, who is allowed to enter a tournament at the discretion of the tournament committee after regularly qualifying competitors have been selected. 1

See all 7 definitions of wild-card

Information block about the term

Origin of wild-card

First appearance:

before 1955

One of the 4% newest English words

First recorded in 1955-60

Historical Comparancy

Parts of speech for Wild-card

noun

adjective

verb

adverb

pronoun

preposition

conjunction

determiner

exclamation

Full grammatical hierarchy of Wild-card

wild-card popularity

A pretty common term. Usually people know it’s meaning, but prefer to use a more spread out synonym. About 36% of English native speakers know the meaning and use word.

This word is included in each student's vocabulary. Most likely there is at least one movie with this word in the title.