galactic

UK/ɡəˈlæktɪk/US/ɡəˈlæktɪk/

adjectiveB2+Common in everyday speech and writing · #7,974 of 15,258neutral

Galactic means to do with a galaxy, or inconceivably large. The galactic centre, galactic scale, galactic in scope.

The galactic centre of our own galaxy holds a black hole of four million solar masses. The loose sense means enormous, and intergalactic in casual speech usually means nothing more than very far away. The Greek behind it means milky, from the Milky Way.

Definitions of galactic

1adjectivegalacticTo do with a galaxy, or inconceivably large.B2+
“The film is about a galactic empire that rules thousands of planets.”

galactic is a quality.

Where it comes from

Greek galaktikos means milky, from gala, milk — the Milky Way named the whole class of objects.

Ancient Greek
γαλακτικός — milky
English, today
galactic

Built from

γάλα · Ancient Greek — milk

Borrowed from Ancient Greek γαλακτικός (“milky”), from γάλα (“milk”). a doublet of galactico.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practise this word

galactic in the wild

Works featuring galactic empires may have them as the story's focus, chronicling the empire's growth and/or decline.
Galactic empire
The core stars are a small part within the much wider central region, called the galactic bulge.
Galactic Center
The galactic plane is the plane on which most of a disk-shaped galaxy's mass lies.
Galactic plane
In actual usage, the terms galactic plane and galactic poles usually refer specifically to the plane and poles of the Milky Way, in which planet Earth is located.
Galactic plane
A galactic halo is an extended, roughly spherical component of a galaxy which extends beyond the main, visible component.
Galactic halo

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From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

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