unique

A thing without a like; something unequalled or unparallelled; one of a kind.

Adjective

  1. Being the only one of its kind; unequaled, unparalleled or unmatched.
    • Every person has a unique life, therefore every person has a unique journey.
    • Perhaps the reader will wonder why we have placed our " beings " on a sphere rather than on another closed surface. But this choice has its justification in the fact that, of all closed surfaces, the sphere is unique in...
    • 3. Both were written and published with the same unique chorus structure; 4. Both compositions were written and published with the same unique harmonic structure; - 1941, Allen v. Walt Disney:

    Synonyms: one of a kind sui generis singular one-off

  2. Of a feature, such that only one holder has it.
  3. Particular, characteristic.
  4. Rare or unusual.
    • And as I look back, it seems to me that we were fairly unique, the sixty of us, in that there wasn’t one good mixer in the bunch. - 1950, J.D. Salinger, For Esmé—With Love and Squalor:

Origin

Borrowed from French unique, from Latin unicus. Doublet of unic.

Forms

uniquer more unique uniquest most unique

Synonyms

alone azygous incomparable matchless nonpareil only peerless singular sui generis unequaled unique unparalleled unmatched unrivalled

Antonyms

common normal

Hypernyms

rare

Hyponyms

newfangled novel original unprecedented

Related

unicity one-of-a-kind inimitable first and last ideal nonesuch one of a kind one-off paragon snowflake sole solitary strange uniqueness

Derived

non-unique uniq fruit unique factorization domain unique factorization ring unique-headed bug unique identification number unique identifier unique key uniquel uniqueness uniquify uniquity universally unique identifier

Noun

  1. A thing without a like; something unequalled or unparallelled; one of a kind.
    • The phoenix, the unique of birds. - a. 1859, Thomas De Quincey, Language:
    • […] uniques of the game, Sauron and Morgoth, are found on levels 99 and 100 of the dungeon respectively, […] - 2020, John Harris, Exploring Roguelike Games:

Forms

uniques