# digital

Pronunciation: say "DIJ-i-tuhl" /ˈdɪd͡ʒɪtl̩/

## Adjective

1. Relating to computers, the internet, and the technology of the Information Age.
   - Simple: Connected with computers, the internet, and the online world.
   - _The company shifted to a fully digital workflow during the pandemic._
   - _Children today are digital natives who grew up with smartphones._
2. Representing values as discrete numbers, often binary, rather than as a continuous range.
   - Simple: Using separate numbers to show or carry information, instead of one smooth, continuous signal.
   - _Engineers prefer digital signals because they resist noise better than analog ones._
   - _The thermometer gives a digital readout instead of a rising column of liquid._
4. Relating to the fingers or toes; especially, carried out with a finger.
   - Simple: Having to do with the fingers or toes, or done with a finger.
   - _The surgeon performed a digital examination to feel for the lump._
   - _Swelling in the digital joints is often an early sign of arthritis._

## Noun

3. Electronic equipment and technology of the computerized kind, taken together as a whole.
   - Simple: Electronic equipment and technology that works using computers.
   - _Advertising budgets have shifted steadily toward digital over the past decade._
   - _Newsrooms that ignored digital lost readers to online rivals._
5. Short for digital watch: a watch that shows the time in numerals on a display rather than with hands. — Ellipsis of digital watch.
   - Simple: Short for digital watch: a watch that shows the time as numbers instead of moving hands.
   - _He swapped his old analog watch for a sleek digital in the eighties._
   - _She liked a digital because she could read it at a glance in the dark._
6. Short for digital art: art created or presented using computers and other digital technology. *(colloquial)* — Ellipsis of digital art.
   - Simple: Short for digital art. It means pictures and other art made on a computer.
   - _Galleries are finally starting to exhibit digital alongside traditional paintings._
   - _After years of painting in acrylics, she switched to digital and now sells prints of her work online._

## Other meanings

- (noun) A finger, used playfully or as a joke.
- (noun) An option contract that pays a fixed, set amount if the underlying asset meets a condition at expiry, and nothing if it does not.
- (noun) Any one of the keys pressed to play a piano or a similar keyboard instrument.

## Origin

Latin digitālis was formed from digitus ("finger, toe") with the suffix -alis and was borrowed into English. In English terms it equals digit plus -al, and digitalis is a doublet.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/digital (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).