different between useful vs apropos

English

Etymology

From use +? -ful.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /?ju?sf?l/

Adjective

useful (comparative usefuller or more useful, superlative usefullest or most useful)

1. Having a practical or beneficial use.

   Synonyms: noteful, serviceable, utilitarian, utile

   Antonyms: unuseful, useless, harmful

Usage notes

• Prepositions: useful is used in useful for <purpose>, useful for <person> and useful to <person>. The words useful to are also found in constructions such as It is useful to do, in which to marks an infinitive rather than being a preposition.

Derived terms

Translations

English

Alternative forms

• à propos
• àpropos

Etymology

Borrowed from French à propos (“on that subject”).

Pronunciation

• (UK) IPA^(key): /?æp.???p??/
• (US) IPA^(key): /?æp.???po?/
• Rhymes: -??

Adjective

apropos (comparative more apropos, superlative most apropos)

1. Of an appropriate or pertinent nature.
   • 1877, Jules Verne, translated by Frederick Amadeus Malleson, Journey into the Interior of the Earth, Chapter VI,

     Nothing easier. I received not long ago a map from my friend, Augustus Petermann, at Leipzig. Nothing could be more apropos.
2. by the way, incidental
   • 1877, Arthur Conan Doyle, A Study in Scarlet

     Sherlock Holmes rose and lit his pipe. "No doubt you think that you are complimenting me in comparing me to Dupin," he observed. "Now, in my opinion, Dupin was a very inferior fellow. That trick of his of breaking in on his friends' thoughts with an apropos remark after a quarter of an hour's silence is really very showy and superficial. He had some analytical genius, no doubt; but he was by no means such a phenomenon as Poe appeared to imagine."

Synonyms

• (by the way): by the way, incidentally, incidental

Translations

Preposition

apropos

1. Regarding or concerning.
   • 2011, Jeremy Harding, "Diary", London Review of Books, 33.VII:

     Few have the same root and branch obsession with the recent past or the avenger’s recall (‘the necessity for long memory and sarcasm in argument’, as he wrote apropos the old left intelligentsia in New York).

Synonyms

• about, as for; See also Thesaurus:about

Antonyms

• malapropos

Derived terms

• apropos of
• apropos of nothing

Translations

Adverb

apropos

1. By the way.
2. Timely; at a good time.
3. To the purpose; appropriately.

Translations

Anagrams

• Sapporo

Danish

Alternative forms

• (nonstandard) à propos

Etymology

Borrowed from French à propos.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /apropo/, [ap???op?o], [?p???op?o]

Noun

apropos n (singular definite aproposet or apropos'et, plural indefinite aproposer or apropos'er)

1. aside

Inflection

Preposition

apropos

1. apropos (regarding or concerning)

Adverb

apropos

1. apropos

German

Etymology

Borrowed from French à propos.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): [ap?o?po?]

Adverb

apropos

1. apropos

Synonyms

• nebenbei
• übrigens

Further reading

• “apropos” in Duden online