Careful means paying enough attention that nothing goes wrong. Carrying a full mug across a room, cutting round a curve with scissors, reading the contract before you put your name at the bottom.
Careful takes several prepositions and each one shifts the meaning: careful WITH the knives is about handling, careful ABOUT what you say is about thinking first, careful OF the step is a warning, and careful TO lock up is about not forgetting. On its own, Careful! is a shout. It also praises thoroughness — careful work, a careful reading of the letter — and said about money it is a polite way of calling somebody tight. The opposite is careless, which means the mistakes have already happened.
1adjectivecarefulGiving something enough attention to avoid harm or mistakes.~39%
“Be careful with that box; there is glass in the bottom of it.”
2adjectivedoneDone thoroughly and with attention to detail.~59%
“A careful reading of the small print saved them a lot of money.”
3adjectiveunwillingUnwilling to spend much money.~2%
“They were careful with money all their lives and never borrowed a penny.”
Shares are an estimate: a language model read 10 sentences found in the wild and placed 10 of them on a sense — a count of our sample, not a measurement of English.
Also accepted in games: cautious
Careful is Old English carful: care with -ful on the end, from a time when -ful meant plainly 'full of'. A careful person is full of care. The shape has barely moved in a thousand years, which is unusual for a word this common.
Proto-Indo-European
*ǵeh₂r-
Old English
carful
Middle English
careful
English, today
careful
From Middle English careful, from Old English carful; equivalent to care + -ful.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA