Effective typically describes things—such as policies, treatments, arguments, and techniques—that do what they are intended to do. People can also be described as effective when they accomplish what …

EFFECTIVE definition: 1. successful or achieving the results that you want: 2. (used about a treatment or drug) working…. Learn more.

The adjective effective describes things that are adequate to accomplish a purpose, or that produce the intended or expected result. But effective isn’t quite the same as effectual, efficacious, or efficient!

Effective and efficient are often confused, but they have slightly different meanings. If you are effective, you do a job properly; if you are efficient, you do it quickly and easily.

Effectiveness or effectivity[1] is the capability of producing a desired result or the ability to produce desired output. When something is deemed effective, it means it has an intended or expected …

Effective means having a particular role or result in practice, though not officially or in theory. They have had effective control of the area since the security forces left. The restructuring resulted in an …

Aug 28, 2025 · Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary from 1913 lists efficient and effective as synonyms, but all major dictionaries now show that these words now only have different meanings in …

Find 855 different ways to say EFFECTIVE, along with antonyms, related words, and example sentences at Thesaurus.com.

effective meaning, definition, what is effective: successful, and working in the way that ...: Learn more.

The adjective effective has many shades of meaning, but you'll usually see it describing something that's able to produce a desired goal. Effective traces back to the Latin word effectivus, from efficere, …