A nice family.
- An example of nice is a description for a person who is friendly and who everyone likes.
- An example of nice is a sofa in good condition from a good store.
- ignorant; foolish
- coy; shy
- Archaic difficult to please; fastidious; refined; scrupulous
- delicate; precise; discriminative; subtle: a nice distinction
- calling for great care, accuracy, tact, etc., as in handling or discrimination: a nice problem of diplomacy
- able to make fine or delicate distinctions
- a generalized term of approval meaning variously:
- agreeable; pleasant; delightful
- attractive; pretty
- kind and considerate
- conforming to approved social standards; respectable
- in good taste
- good; excellent
Origin of niceME, strange, lazy, foolish from Old French nice, nisce, stupid, foolish from Classical Latin nescius, ignorant, not knowing from nescire, to be ignorant from ne-, not (see no) + scire, to know: see science
- Pleasing and agreeable in nature: had a nice time; a nice person.
- Having a pleasant or attractive appearance: a nice dress; a nice face.
- Exhibiting courtesy and politeness: a nice gesture.
- Of good character and reputation; respectable.
- Overdelicate or fastidious; fussy.
- Showing or requiring great precision or sensitive discernment; subtle: a nice distinction; a nice sense of style.
- Done with delicacy and skill: a nice bit of craft.
- Used as an intensive with and : nice and warm.
- Obsolete a. Wanton; profligate: “For when mine hours / Were nice and lucky, men did ransom lives / Of me for jests” ( Shakespeare )b. Affectedly modest; coy: “Ere … / The nice Morn on th' Indian steep, / From her cabin'd loop-hole peep” ( John Milton )
Origin of niceMiddle English foolish from Old French from Latin nescius ignorant from nescīre to be ignorant ; see nescience .
(comparative nicer, superlative nicest)
- (now rare) Particular in one's conduct; scrupulous, painstaking; choosy. [from 14th c.]
- Showing or requiring great precision or sensitive discernment; subtle. [from 16th c.]
- 1822, T. Creevey, Reminiscences, 28 Jul:
- It has been a damned nice thing - the nearest run thing you ever saw in your life.
- Respectable; virtuous. [from 18th c.]
- What is a nice person like you doing in a place like this?
- Pleasant, satisfactory. [from 18th c.]
- Of a person: friendly, attractive. [from 18th c.]
- With "and", having intensive effect: extremely. [from 18th c.]
- The soup is nice and hot.
(comparative more nice, superlative most nice)
- (colloquial) Nicely.
- Children, play nice.
- He dresses real nice.
From Middle English nice, nyce, nys, from Old French nice, niche, nisce (“simple, foolish, ignorant"), from Latin nescius (“ignorant, not knowing"); compare nescire (“to know not, be ignorant of"), from ne (“not") + scire (“to know").
(third-person singular simple present nices, present participle nicing, simple past and past participle niced)
Name of a Unix program used to invoke a script or program with a specified priority, with the implication that running at a lower priority is "nice" (kind, etc.) because it leaves more resources for others.