fastidious

adjective

fa-ˈsti-dē-əs How to pronounce fastidious (audio)
Definition of fastidiousnext
as in careful
hard to please he is very fastidious about how he arranges his music collection, and woe to anyone who dares to mess around with it

Synonyms & Similar Words

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Antonyms & Near Antonyms

Example Sentences

Examples are automatically compiled from online sources to show current usage. Read More Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Recent Examples of fastidious No such thing as a flop era for the fastidious Atlantic Trivia player. — Drew Goins, The Atlantic, 9 July 2026 The irony is that in not trying to pass muster with more conservative theatergoers (and their fastidious institutional guardians), playwrights have been winning over not just critics but also formerly squeamish artistic directors and perennially nervous Broadway producers. — Theater Critic, Los Angeles Times, 29 June 2026 Diana was fastidious about controlling her narrative. — Stephanie Nolasco , Ashley Papa, FOXNews.com, 9 June 2026 Lamarre is fastidious in covering all the key elements of the story that touched directly on Hartford. — Christopher Arnott, Hartford Courant, 27 Apr. 2026 See All Example Sentences for fastidious
Recent Examples of Synonyms for fastidious
  1. careful
  2. nice
  3. particular
  4. finicky
  5. exacting
  6. persnickety
  7. picky
  8. fussy
Adjective
  • Getting to that point required careful control of stress during fabrication.
    — Neetika Walter, Interesting Engineering, 3 Sep. 2026
  • Huntsinger, playing along with Variety’s should-win/will-win Emmy prediction game, drew a careful line.
    — Clayton Davis, Variety, 3 Sep. 2026
Definition of careful
Adjective
  • This one is a nice pick for yourself or someone else who wants to try a handful of trending beauty brands to find their new holy grail products.
    — Alanna Martine Kilkeary, Glamour, 31 Aug. 2026
  • The brown one’s okay, but purple — looking royal — that’d be nice.
    — Maria Bamford, Vulture, 31 Aug. 2026
Definition of nice
Adjective
  • One day, Cole paged through an album whose acidic glues caused her particular anguish.
    — Laura Preston, New Yorker, 30 Aug. 2026
  • Shape-memory polymers can be programmed to return to a particular shape after exposure to a stimulus, often heat.
    — Kaif Shaikh, Interesting Engineering, 30 Aug. 2026
Definition of particular
Adjective
  • Moisture trapped in the ground allows finicky crops such as onions and peanuts to grow.
    — Adrien Marotte, Christian Science Monitor, 20 Aug. 2026
  • Their odds of winning the World Series – a famously finicky task prone to small sample size flukes – were over 25%, one-in-four for one of baseball’s 30 teams.
    — Hannah Keyser, CNN Money, 13 Aug. 2026
Definition of finicky
Adjective
  • Every place on this list has been vetted and endorsed, again and again, by the world’s most exacting travelers.
    — Laura Dannen Redman, Robb Report, 23 July 2026
  • Loathe have always been committed to self-production (their 2017 debut is their only album that credits an outside co-producer), but A Stranger to You begs for more exacting supervision.
    — Patrick Lyons, Pitchfork, 16 July 2026
Definition of exacting
Adjective
  • The team then turned to an open-source model developed in China, which was less persnickety.
    — Stephen Witt, New Yorker, 30 July 2026
  • Imagine creating a new standard of hypersensitive caution about attracting even the most persnickety media criticism, and then applying it for the first time to your son’s wedding.
    — Jonathan Chait, The Atlantic, 21 May 2026
Definition of persnickety
Adjective
  • Some producers will get much more picky about that and spend a lot of time aligning the playing to the grid.
    — Amanda Petrusich, New Yorker, 30 Aug. 2026
  • Violet helleborines are incredibly picky orchids, requiring a mature beech forest growing on a clay soil overlaid on chalk.
    — Literary Hub, Literary Hub, 20 Aug. 2026
Definition of picky
Adjective
  • Baby is fussy, so back to Mom to eat as suitor Robert Pattinson tries his shot at Anne Hathaway.
    — Zachary Pincus-Roth, USA Today, 3 Sep. 2026
  • The long-sleeve, open-front design offers lightweight coverage with no fussy buttons or zippers, while functional front pockets are deep enough for a phone, keys, and other small essentials.
    — Better Homes & Gardens, Better Homes & Gardens, 30 Aug. 2026
Definition of fussy

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fast-forwards
fastidious
fastidiously
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Cite this Entry

“Fastidious.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/fastidious. Accessed 5 Sep. 2026.

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