DictionaryAI

competent

adjective
KOM-puh-tuhnt/ˈkɒmpətənt/

6 meanings of competent

Practice

  1. 1
    adjective
    Having enough skill, knowledge, ability, or qualifications to do something properly.

    The committee hired a competent engineer to oversee the bridge repairs.

    Years of steady practice made her a thoroughly competent translator.

    Similarcapable, able, skilled, proficient, qualified

    Oppositeincompetent, inept, incapable, unskilled

    Note

    The everyday sense, and the one closest to its Latin root: competens, from competō, 'to be equal to, be capable of'. To be competent is to be equal to a task. That means enough, not outstanding, so a competent skier set beside an expert snowboarder reads as modest praise. Joyce's 'competent men' in Ulysses (1922) are the qualified, the people fit to explain.

  2. 2
    adjective
    Good enough for the particular purpose at hand, meeting requirements without excelling.

    The report was competent enough to satisfy the auditors.

    His performance was competent, covering every requirement without any flair.

    Similaradequate, satisfactory, acceptable, passable, serviceable

    Oppositeinadequate, unsatisfactory, poor

    Note

    Here the adequacy belongs to a thing or an amount rather than a person. Henry More, in An Antidote Against Atheism (1662), writes of birds bringing forth 'any competent number at a time', meaning a sufficient number. Applied to work, it carries the same 'enough' as the skill sense: a competent report passes, but nobody is praising it.

  3. 3
    adjective
    Of a court, official, or other body, legally empowered to deal with a particular issue or question.

    The treaty must be ratified by the competent national authority.

    A competent tribunal heard the boundary dispute between the two states.

    Similarappropriate, relevant, authorized

    Note

    A lawyer's word for the right body rather than the skilled one. The competent court is the one with jurisdiction, whatever its judges' ability. It sits in fixed phrases such as competent court, competent authority and an authority having competent jurisdiction. Contracts use it to name which court will hear disputes. Do not read it as praise: a brilliant tribunal without jurisdiction is not competent here.

  4. 4
    adjective
    Of a tissue or body system, working properly and performing its normal function adequately.

    Imaging showed a competent valve with no signs of leakage.

    Patients with a competent immune system usually recover quickly.

    Similarfunctional, healthy, sound

    Oppositeincompetent

    Note

    Clinicians use it of body parts the way an engineer might say a part is sound. A competent sphincter, a competent cervix or a competent immune system is one that does its job. It usually stands before the noun naming the organ or system. It describes function, not anyone's skill, and has nothing to do with the everyday sense.

  5. 5
    adjective
    Of a cell, able to take up foreign DNA from its surroundings across the cell membrane.

    The lab chilled the bacteria with calcium chloride to render them competent.

    Competent cells absorbed the plasmid during the brief heat shock.

    Note

    A laboratory term for cells that can take in foreign DNA. The word describes how permeable the cell wall is, not any ability in the ordinary sense: competent cells are simply open to incoming genetic material. Some bacteria are naturally in this state, and others are made competent in the lab, so the word often follows render or make.

  6. 6
    adjective
    Of a rock or rock layer, resistant to deformation or flow under stress.

    The competent sandstone bed folded sharply while the softer shale flowed around it.

    Tunneling is safer through competent rock that holds its shape.

    Similarrigid, strong

    Oppositeincompetent

    Note

    Geologists sort rock layers by how they behave under stress, and a competent bed is one that resists flowing. It holds its shape, folding or fracturing as a unit while weaker neighboring layers flow around it. That contrast is the point. A layer is usually called competent relative to the rock beside it, not in absolute terms.

Practice

Can you tell the meanings of competent apart? Answer 3 quick questions from this page, or write your own sentence and AI will check it.

Origin

From Middle English competent, from Old French competent, from Latin competens, the present participle of competō ("coincide, be equal to, be capable of"). It is related to Dutch, German, and Danish competent.