component

Pluralcomponents

1. 1
   nouncountable

   One part of a bigger thing, often a piece made to fit inside a machine.

   Like one puzzle piece: the whole picture needs every piece in its place.

   A single broken component stopped the whole washing machine.

   The repair shop keeps spare components for older phones.

   Similarpart, element, piece, constituent, ingredient

   Note
2. 2
   adjective

   Being one of the smaller parts that together make a bigger whole.

   Like one slice of a pizza: each slice is a part of the whole pie.

   We took the clock apart to see its component pieces.

   The teacher broke the lesson into its component steps.

   Similarconstituent

   Note
3. 3
   adjective

   Built from separate, complete parts that work together as one system.

   Like a train made of separate cars that join together to form one train.

   Their component sound system has separate speakers and a separate player.

   The component shelves arrive in boxes, and you stack the units any way you like.

   Similarmodular, prefabricated

   Oppositeintegrated, all-in-one

   Note
4. 4
   nouncountable

   In math, a group of points in a network that are all connected to each other but not to the rest.

   Like islands on a map: you can walk anywhere on one island, but you cannot walk to another.

   When we erased that one line, the drawing of dots broke into two separate components.

   One component of our network drawing was a single dot with no lines to anything else.

   Note

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