feature

From Middle English feture, from Anglo-Norman feture, from Old French faiture, from Latin factūra. Doublet of facture.

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈfiːtʃə/
• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈfitʃɚ/

• Audio (US)

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• Rhymes: -iːtʃə(ɹ)

feature (plural features)

1. (obsolete) One's structure or make-up: form, shape, bodily proportions.
   • 1596, Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene, IV.ii:

     all the powres of nature, / Which she by art could vse vnto her will, / And to her seruice bind each liuing creature; / Through secret vnderstanding of their feature.

2. An important or main item.
3. (media) A long, prominent article or item in the media, or the department that creates them; frequently used technically to distinguish content from news.
4. Any of the physical constituents of the face (eyes, nose, etc.).
5. (computing) A beneficial capability of a piece of software.
   • 2002, Sam Williams, Free as in Freedom:

     The program contained an internal feature, which allowed a user to update display text after each command keystroke.

6. The cast or structure of anything, or of any part of a thing, as of a landscape, a picture, a treaty, or an essay; any marked peculiarity or characteristic.

   one of the features of the landscape.

   • 1911, 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica:

     The most prominent feature of the New England land system was the town grant, which in every case became the territorial basis of a group settlement.

7. (archaeology) Something discerned from physical evidence that helps define, identify, characterize, and interpret an archeological site.

   • A feature of many Central Texas prehistoric archeological sites is a low spreading pile of stones called a rock midden. Other features at these sites may include small hearths.

8. (engineering) Characteristic forms or shapes of parts. For example, a hole, boss, slot, cut, chamfer, or fillet.
9. (machine learning) An individual measurable property or characteristic of a phenomenon being observed.
10. (music) The act of being featured in a piece of music.

• See also Thesaurus:characteristic

• featural
• feature article

• feature in Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary, G. & C. Merriam, 1913.

feature (third-person singular simple present features, present participle featuring, simple past and past participle featured)

1. (transitive) To ascribe the greatest importance to something within a certain context.
2. (transitive) To star, to contain.
3. (intransitive) To appear, to make an appearance.
   • 2009 November 27, “Jimi Hendrix's Voodoo Child has 'best guitar riff'”, in BBC‎:

     Led Zeppelin's Whole Lotta Love, Deep Purple's Smoke On The Water and Layla by Derek and the Dominos also featured in the top five.

4. (transitive, dated) To have features resembling.
   • Sunday. Reading for the Young (page 219)

     More than his talents, Roger grudged him his looks, the brown eyes, golden hair, and oval face, which made people say how Johnny Weir featured his mother.

feature

1. Alternative form of feture