system
Pluralsystems
- 1A group or set of related parts that work together as a single, complex whole.
Engineers studied how each part of the transit system depended on the others.
A coral reef forms a delicate system where many species rely on one another.
Similarstructure, arrangement, organization, complex
Note
The broad sense that every specialized one narrows. In Latin it could already mean a musical scale, a body of troops or a set of celestial objects, so the astronomer's gravitational sense echoes a meaning older than English, while the musical staves belong to later staff notation. Structure and organization stress arrangement; system stresses parts working together.
Checked 3 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
- Latin systema could mean a musical scale, a body of troops or a set of celestial objects; the astronomical sense therefore has an antecedent older than English. en.wiktionary.org
- The musical staves belong to staff notation developed later than the Latin meanings. en.wikipedia.org
- 2The combined hardware and software that operate together within a computer.
The bank's computer system crashed, leaving customers unable to withdraw cash for hours.
Administrators patched every system on the network overnight.
UsageOften the system: the system is down, the system crashed.
Note
Here the word covers the whole working machine, with hardware and software counted together. That is why administrators speak of patching every system on a network. Operating system narrows it to one part, the software layer that manages everything else. In ordinary office talk, the system often stands for the entire computing setup a place depends on.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 1 fact
- An operating system is software that manages a computer’s hardware and applications. ibm.com
- 3An organized method or set of rules and procedures for doing something or running an activity, such as a game.
He developed a system for sorting incoming orders by priority.
Their training system pairs each newcomer with an experienced mentor.
UsageSay a system for doing something.
- 4A set of body organs that work together to perform a particular function.
The respiratory system delivers oxygen to the blood and removes carbon dioxide.
Damage to the immune system leaves the body open to infection.
UsageThe adjective comes first, usually with the: the digestive system, the nervous system.
Note
The plural compares kinds, as when Terence J. Dawson writes in 1995 that kangaroos evolved a digestive system with much in common with those of ruminant mammals.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 1 fact
- Terence J. Dawson writes that kangaroos evolved a digestive system with much in common with those of ruminant mammals. en.wiktionary.org
- 5Someone's body, or body and mind, treated as one whole, especially in how it responds to food, drugs, or shocks.
The blood test found traces of a sedative in his system.
Losing her job and her home in the same week was a terrible shock to her system.
UsageSet phrases: in your system, a shock to the system, get it out of your system.
Similarbody
Note
The idiom get it out of your system stretches the meaning to feelings and urges: you get anger or a craving out of your system by indulging it until it fades.
- 6A particular socioeconomic order: the overall way a society structures its economy and political power.
Historians debate how the feudal system gave way to early capitalism.
A market system distributes goods through prices rather than central planning.
UsageUsually named by its kind: the capitalist system, the feudal system, a market system.
Similarorder
Note
Used this way, the word describes rather than accuses. That separates it from the resentful "the System", where the word stands alone and the speaker is pushing back against it.
- 7A set of two or more objects bound to one another by gravity, such as stars and the bodies orbiting them.
The binary system contains two stars locked in mutual orbit.
Telescopes revealed a distant system of planets around a young star.
UsageThe name or type goes first: the solar system, a binary system, the Arcturus system.
Note
Astronomers attach the word to a star's name or to a defining feature: the solar system, a binary system, a planetary system. Science fiction borrows the pattern freely. In Mass Effect 3 (2012), for example, asteroids are shipped to "the nearby Arcturus system".
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
- Mass Effect 3 was released in 2012. news.ea.com
- Mass Effect 3 describes companies shipping asteroids to “the nearby Arcturus system”; the quoted wording is exact and comes from the description of Yukawa. en.wiktionary.org
- 8A comprehensive and logically organized set of propositions or philosophical beliefs that fit together as a coherent whole.
Kant built a system that linked knowledge, morality, and aesthetics.
Each metaphysical system tries to explain reality from a few basic principles.
UsageOften used with of (a system of thought), an adjective (a philosophical system), or a thinker's name (Kant's system).
Similarstructure
Note
The word implies more than a set of opinions, because each proposition is meant to fit the others. That is what makes a system something a reader can enter whole, or find, as David McIlwain reports Rosen saying of Kojève's in 2019, "hypnotic".
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
- David McIlwain reports Stanley Rosen describing the quality of Alexandre Kojève’s system as “hypnotic.” link.springer.com
- McIlwain’s report was published in 2019. link.springer.com
Less common meanings
- 9The mainstream institutions and culture controlled by a state's elites or government, regarded as oppressive to the individual.
Activists accused the system of crushing anyone who dared to dissent.
As a teenager he wore ripped jeans and played loud punk music, sure he was rebelling against the system.
UsageUsed with the: rebel against the system. In neutral writing, name the institution you mean.
Similarestablishment
Note
A hostile shorthand for the powers that be, used with the and often capitalized, as in Rudyard Kipling's "Write him off to the System" in his story "The Phantom Rickshaw". Lowercase works too, as in Madonna's 1986 song "Where's the Party". It keeps company with the man and Big Brother.
Checked 3 Nov 2026 · 4 facts
- Rudyard Kipling wrote the story "The Phantom Rickshaw". gutenberg.org
- The quotation "Write him off to the System" occurs in that story, spoken by Heatherlegh. gutenberg.org
- Madonna's "Where's the Party" was released in 1986, on True Blue. madonna.com
- The song's lyrics use lowercase "the system". madonna.com
- 10A collection of equations in a common set of variables, all of which must be satisfied by the same solution.
Students learned to solve the system using substitution and elimination.
A linear system with more equations than unknowns may have no solution.
UsageThe full phrase is a system of equations; you solve it.
Note
Equations become a system when they must be satisfied together: a solution has to work in every one of them at once, not in each separately.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 1 fact
- A solution to a system must satisfy every equation with the same values of the variables. openstax.org
- 11A set of musical staves joined at the left by a vertical line, sometimes with braces or brackets, showing parts to be played at the same time.
The orchestral score packs a dozen staves into each system.
The engraver fit four systems on each page so the pianist could turn pages less often.
Note
An engraver's and performer's word for one full line of a score, taking in every part that sounds together. It is the stack of staves joined at the left by a brace or a single vertical line and read together. A stave is one set of lines; a system is the group of them. Players move from system to system much as readers move from line to line.
Checked 3 Nov 2026 · 6 facts
- A system is one line of music comprising vertically grouped staves. lilypond.org
- The parts shown on the grouped staves are played simultaneously. en.wikipedia.org
- The staves forming a system are joined at the left by a vertical line or brace. opencurriculum.org
- A stave is a set of lines. opencurriculum.org
- A system groups staves vertically. lilypond.org
- Moving to the next system corresponds to moving to the next line. lilypond.org
- 12The set of distinct alters belonging to one person with multiple identities, or the multiple person who contains them.
Practice
Can you tell the meanings of system apart? Answer 3 quick questions from this page, or write your own sentence and AI will check it.
Origin
English took "system" partly from Middle French sisteme/systeme and partly straight from Late Latin systēma ("harmony; musical scale; set of things; system"). That came from Ancient Greek sústēma ("organized body; whole made of several parts"), formed from sunístēmi ("to combine, organize"): itself from sun- ("together") plus hístēmi ("to stand"), from the Proto-Indo-European root *steh₂- ("to stand").
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 7 facts
- English borrowed system partly through Middle French and partly directly from Late Latin. en.wiktionary.org
- The Latin word had senses covering harmony, musical scale, sets of things, and system. en.wiktionary.org
- Latin systēma came from Ancient Greek sústēma. en.wiktionary.org
- Ancient Greek sústēma meant an organized body or a whole consisting of several parts. en.wiktionary.org
- Sústēma was formed from sunístēmi, meaning to combine or organize. en.wiktionary.org
- Sunístēmi combines sun-, meaning together, and hístēmi, meaning to stand. en.wiktionary.org
- Hístēmi derives ultimately from the Proto-Indo-European root *steh₂-, meaning to stand. en.wiktionary.org