fidelity

Merriam-Webster's Word of the Day for November 3, 2025 is: fidelity • fuh-DELL-uh-tee  • noun Fidelity is the quality or state of being faithful to a person, such as a partner or spouse, or a thing, such as one’s country. Fidelity can also refer to accuracy or exactness in details, or the degree to which an electronic device (such as a television) accurately reproduces its effect (such as sound or picture). // After almost three decades on the job, no one can doubt their fidelity to the company. // The movie’s director insisted on total fidelity to the book. See the entry > Examples: “The origins of the role [of ring bearer] actually have their roots in ancient Egypt, where a young boy would be enlisted to carry rings to a couple as a symbol of love, fidelity, and fertility.” — Shelby Wax, Vogue, 10 July 2025 Did you know? Fidelity came to English by way of Middle French in the 15th century, and can ultimately be traced back to the Latin adjective fidēlis, meaning “faithful, loyal, trustworthy.” While fidelity was originally exclusively about loyalty, it has for centuries also been used to refer to accuracy, as in “questions about the fidelity of the translation.” Nowadays fidelity is often used in reference to recording and broadcast devices, conveying the idea that a broadcast or recording is “faithful” to the live sound or picture that it reproduces.