utility
Pluralutilities
Pluralutilities
- 1A commodity or service supplied continuously through a physical infrastructure network, such as electricity, water, or sewerage.
The city council voted to keep the water utility under public ownership.
Rural areas often wait years for basic utilities to reach them.
Similarservice
Note
On a building site, utilities are physical objects: the gas mains, water pipes and telecoms cables buried under a street. RAIL magazine's 2025 reports on Euston and on Coventry's Very Light Rail describe the costly work of "diverting utilities" before track can be laid. Utility diversion is the standard term for that work. In this sense the word is usually plural, and service is its everyday synonym.
- 2The degree to which something serves a practical purpose; usefulness.
Critics questioned the utility of adding another committee.
The software proved its utility within the first week of use.
Similarusefulness, use, value, benefit, worth
Oppositeuselessness, futility
Note
The root meaning that every other sense branches from: Middle English utilite, through Old French from Latin ūtilitās, built on uti, "to use." In English terms the word is simply utile plus -ity. The phrase "has its utility," from Jane Austen's Persuasion (1817), shows a typical move: granting that something is useful while declining to approve of it.
- 3An object or thing that serves a useful purpose.
A sharp knife is among the most basic utilities in any kitchen.
He saw the spare generator as a utility worth its cost.
Similartool, implement, device
Note
Here usefulness is turned into a thing, the useful object itself. H. C. Casserley, reflecting on British locomotives in 1945, calls the humble 0-6-0 engine the backbone of "general service, or general utility." The collocation general utility names the workhorse that does every ordinary job rather than one special one.
- 4Relating to, or owned by, a company that provides public services such as power or water.
Utility regulators approved the new pricing structure last month.
The land was crossed by several utility easements.
Note
A noun working as an adjective, so it stands only before another noun: a utility bill, a utility line, utility regulators. It points to the service company and what that company owns or charges. It has no comparative, and it cannot follow a verb. Nobody says a bill is "very utility."
- 5Designed for practical function rather than visual appeal.
The building's utility design favored durability over style.
She wore sturdy utility boots built for hard work.
Similarutilitarian, functional, practical, serviceable, workaday
Oppositedecorative, ornamental, fancy
Note
Plainness on purpose: things built to work, with looks a secondary concern. Railway Magazine in 1943 reported the Great Western Railway replacing its chocolate-and-cream livery with "an all-over utility coating of reddish-brown." The phrasing suggests a downgrade from something handsomer. The word often carries that faint note of making do, as in utility boots or a utility design.
- 6A software program built to perform a single task or a few related tasks, often to manage or tune hardware, an operating system, or other software.
The system administrator ran a utility to defragment the disk.
A built-in utility lets you compress large folders quickly.
Note
Usually named by what it works on: a disk utility recovers deleted files, a file utility tidies them. InfoWorld in 1982 already counts assemblers and downloaders among a system's utilities, so the word covers developers' tools as well as housekeeping ones. Narrower than the "not a game" sense, which sorts software by purpose, this one sorts it by scope: one job, usually done for the machine rather than the user.
- 7The capacity of a good to satisfy needs or wants, and the satisfaction a consumer gets from it.
Economists assume buyers choose the basket of goods that gives them the most utility.
The marginal utility of water is low when it is plentiful.
Similarsatisfaction
Oppositedisutility
Note
Economics uses one word for both sides of a purchase: a good's power to satisfy a want, and the satisfaction the buyer actually feels. Theory models consumers as maximizing total utility within a budget constraint. Its constant partner is marginal. Marginal utility is the gain from one more unit, which is why a plentiful necessity like water can be cheap.
- 8Containing or meant for a building's pipes, wires, or equipment such as furnaces, water heaters, breakers, or laundry machines.
The furnace and breaker panel sit in a basement utility space.
Plumbers routed the new pipes through the utility shaft.
Similarmechanical
Note
A builder's and homeowner's word for the parts of a building that house its machinery rather than its life. A utility room or utility corridor holds the pipework, wiring, breaker panel, furnace and water heater, and often the laundry machines too. Not everything in it comes from a service provider. A washing machine is here because it is equipment, not because it is supplied.
- 9The ability of a player to perform well in several different positions.
Scouts praised the infielder's utility across four positions.
His utility in both defense and midfield made him hard to replace.
Similarversatility, flexibility, adaptability
Note
In team sports this is the versatility coaches prize: one squad member who can cover several positions when injuries or tactics demand it. The word is usually possessive and specific, as in "his utility in defense and midfield." Praising a player's utility credits their range rather than their excellence in any one role.
- 10A software program other than a game: one made for useful or creative work rather than just entertainment.
The app store separates games from utilities like calendars and note-takers.
He prefers a simple utility for tracking his budget over a flashy game.
Similartool
Note
A classification by purpose. On one side are games; on the other is everything meant for productive or creative work, such as a graphics utility or a music utility. The word is far broader here than in the narrow system tool. A full image editor counts as a utility in this sense simply because it is not a game.
Less common meanings
- 11A company holding a natural or legal monopoly over distributing a public service such as electricity or water, plus its publicly traded securities.
The regional utility announced a merger with a neighboring provider.
Conservative investors often hold utilities for their reliable dividends.
Note
The word slides from the service to the firm that delivers it, and then to the firm's stocks and bonds. Such firms are natural or legal monopolies, because duplicating pipes and wires would be wasteful, so they are usually regulated. Investors speak of "holding utilities" as a class of investment, prized for steady dividends and low volatility.
- 12A car with an open tray or cargo bed behind the passenger cabin.
The farmer parked his mud-spattered utility by the shed.
She tossed the surfboards into the tray of the utility.
Note
An Australian and New Zealand vehicle name, the full form behind the everyday clipping ute. Nevil Shute's The Far Country (1952) shows the shape exactly: a 1946 Chevrolet with "a coupé front seat and an open truck body behind." The longer name is coupé utility. Outside Australia and New Zealand, readers may not recognize the word as a car at all.
- 13A person's overall well-being, satisfaction, pleasure, or happiness.
Utilitarians judge an act by how much utility it produces overall.
The policy aimed to increase the total utility of the community.
Similarwelfare, well-being, happiness, satisfaction, pleasure
Oppositedisutility, suffering
Note
Philosophy's version is wider than the economist's satisfaction. It covers well-being in general, not the pleasure a purchase brings. In utilitarian ethics it becomes the measure of moral value: the right action is the one that produces the most total utility across everyone it affects. Pleasure, happiness and well-being are all candidates for what is being counted.
Showing meanings only.
Practice
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Origin
From Middle English utilite, from Old French utilite (“usefulness”), from Latin ūtilitās, from uti (“to use”).