trial
Pluraltrials
Pluraltrials
Formstrials
- 1A court proceeding in which evidence is presented to a judge, and sometimes a jury, to decide a legal matter, especially whether an accused person is guilty.
The defendant's trial began on Monday with opening statements from both sides.
Witnesses gave conflicting accounts during the trial.
UsageOften with no article: on trial, stand trial, brought to trial, without trial; a or the names one particular case.
- 2A test of how well someone or something works or performs, or a period during which this is tested, as in a free trial or a job on trial.
Engineers conducted a trial of the cooling system under heavy load.
The software passed its final trial without crashing.
UsageCommon phrases: a free trial, give something a trial, a trial of a new system.
Similartest
- 3A research study designed to test the effectiveness and safety of a drug, medical procedure, or similar treatment.
The drug entered a large trial involving thousands of volunteers.
Researchers halted the trial after observing serious side effects.
UsagePeople take part in a trial, and drugs are tested in trials.
Note
Medicine and the sciences use the testing idea for a formal study. Its full name is clinical trial, and the design is named in front of it: a randomized, controlled trial, shortened to RCT. Randomized and controlled describe two separate features of the study, which is why a comma can stand between them.
Checked 5 Nov 2026 · 3 facts
- A formal study testing a medical treatment is called a clinical trial. cancer.gov
- RCT abbreviates randomized controlled trial, a clinical-trial design. toolkit.ncats.nih.gov
- Randomization and the use of a control group are separate features of the study. nih.gov
- 4A difficult or annoying experience, or a person who causes one; in religious contexts, a hardship regarded as a test of faith and piety.
The illness was a trial that tested the whole family's patience.
He bore each trial of his life with quiet faith.
UsageOften a real trial; of a person, use to: a trial to his parents.
Similarordeal, hardship, tribulation, affliction, burden
Note
Something endured rather than conducted. Applied to a person it takes to: "That boy was a trial to his parents", and in Lucy Maud Montgomery's Anne of Green Gables (1908) Anne fears being "a dreadful trial to you". The religious use frames hardship as a testing of faith, as in Bunyan's "time of Trial" in The Pilgrim's Progress (1678).
Checked 5 Nov 2026 · 5 facts
- Lucy Maud Montgomery wrote Anne of Green Gables. en.wikipedia.org
- Anne of Green Gables was first published in 1908. lmmonline.org
- Anne says she fears being a dreadful trial to Marilla; the quoted wording is exact. gutenberg.org
- John Bunyan wrote The Pilgrim's Progress, first published in 1678. en.wikipedia.org
- The phrase time of Trial appears in The Pilgrim's Progress, spoken by Christian. en.wikisource.org
- 5An event in which athletes' or animals' abilities are tested in competition, often to pick a team or decide who goes on to the next stage.
He earned his place on the squad after a grueling trial.
The national trials will decide who represents the country.
UsageOften plural: the national trials, sheepdog trials; a player goes to the trials to win a place.
- 6Done on a provisional or experimental basis, as a test before full adoption.
The new policy began as a trial measure before becoming permanent.
Staff worked a trial schedule for several weeks to test demand.
UsageUsed before a noun: a trial period, a trial run, on a trial basis.
Similarexperimental, pilot, provisional, probationary, tentative
Oppositepermanent
- 7Used before another noun to mean belonging to or used in a trial or test, as in a trial lawyer, trial evidence, or trial results.
The committee examined the trial findings in detail.
Each trial report was filed for later review.
Less common meanings
- 8The act of attempting something, especially repeatedly, as preserved in the phrase "trial and error."
With no manual to guide them, the team worked out the right settings through weeks of trial and error.
After a dozen trials he succeeded in lighting the lantern,
1913, Willa Cather, O Pioneers!UsageToday mostly in by trial and error; elsewhere say attempt or try.
Note
Here the word stays close to its root, Anglo-Norman trier, which also gave English try. A trial is simply an attempt, often one of several. Defoe's Crusoe makes "another trial" at planting seed, and in Willa Cather's O Pioneers! a lantern is lit "after a dozen trials."
- 9To test a new product, method, or person, such as a prospective player, by trying them out before full adoption or selection.
The company decided to trial the app with a small group of users first.
Engineers trialed several designs before choosing the final one.
UsageTakes an object and is often passive: trial a new system, was trialed first. British past tense and past participle: trialled.
Note
The verb splits by spelling. American English writes trialed and trialing, with one l. British English doubles it to trialled and trialling, the form the magazine Rail used in 2020 for a company "trialling the new processes". It takes a direct object, such as a system, a design or a procedure, and sits naturally in the passive: "extensively trialed before being fitted".
Checked 5 Nov 2026 · 3 facts
- The American inflections are trialed and trialing; the British inflections are trialled and trialling. en.wiktionary.org
- Rail used “trialling the new processes” about a company in 2020. en.wiktionary.org
- The quoted passive wording occurs in an illustrative example. en.wiktionary.org
- 10An encounter in which armies or individual fighters engage in combat.
In both your armies there is many a soul / Shall pay full dearly for this encounter, / If once they join in trial.
c. 1597, William Shakespeare, Henry IVNote
Combat understood as a test of strength, the battlefield form of the testing sense. In Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part 1 (c. 1597), armies that "join in trial" meet in battle. The usage is archaic, so in modern prose it reads as deliberate period color; a phrase such as trial of arms keeps it intelligible to a present-day reader.
Checked 5 Nov 2026 · 3 facts
- William Shakespeare wrote Henry IV, Part 1. en.wikipedia.org
- The play can be dated approximately 1597 by composition or first performance. rsc.org.uk
- The words "join in trial" refer to armies engaging in battle; Prince Henry speaks them in Act 5, Scene 1. shakespeare.mit.edu
- 11An internal examination set by Eton College to assess a pupil's progress.
- 12A piece of ware used to test the temperature inside a kiln during firing.
- 13Consisting of three parts or things, usually alike; threefold.
- 14Pertaining to a grammatical form that refers to three of something, such as three people.
- 15The grammatical number used for referring to exactly three of something.
Showing meanings only.
Practice
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Origin
Anglo-Norman trier ('to pick out, cull') with the suffix '-al' gave trial or triel, which became Middle English trial or triall; English try is related.