Meaning of random in English

random

adjective

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/ˈræn.dəm/ us

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/ˈræn.dəm/

happening, done, or chosen by chance rather than according to a plan:

random checks/tests/attacks

We asked a random sample/selection of people what they thought.

informal

strange or unusual:

I just saw Billy wearing a top hat - he's so random!

informal

unknown and unexpected in a particular situation:

Some random guy walked in.

at random

by chance, or without being chosen intentionally:

The winning entry will be the first correct answer drawn at random.

More examples

And what might be the underlying significance of these supposedly random acts of violence?
To my untutored eye that just looks like a load of random brush strokes and yet it's a very valuable painting.
It seems that the attack was a random act of violence.
The survey was carried out among a random sample of voters.
The security guards carried out random checks on people entering the building.

SMART Vocabulary: related words and phrases

Chance and randomness

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You can also find related words, phrases, and synonyms in the topics:

Unique and unusual

Strange, suspicious and unnatural

Not expected or planned

Unknown and unfamiliar

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Related word

randomly

random

noun [ C ]

informal

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/ˈræn.dəm/ us

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/ˈræn.dəm/

an unknown or unexpected person:

You can't make a whole movie with randoms off the street.

More examples

I'm not going to give my phone number to some random who asks for it.
She doesn't want to go on holiday with a load of randoms she doesn't know.

SMART Vocabulary: related words and phrases

Not expected or planned

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You can also find related words, phrases, and synonyms in the topics:

Unknown and unfamiliar

(Definition of random from the Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary & Thesaurus © Cambridge University Press)

random | American Dictionary

random

adjective

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/ˈræn·dəm/

happening, done, or chosen by chance rather than according to a plan or pattern:

a random sample

He was stopped at the border in a random check.

at random

At random means by chance, or without any organization or plan:

Dylan picked several books at random.

randomly

adverb us

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/ˈræn·dəm·li/

The people I interviewed were chosen randomly.

randomness

noun [ U ] us

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/ˈræn·dəm·nəs/

(Definition of random from the Cambridge Academic Content Dictionary © Cambridge University Press)

random | Business English

random

adjective

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/ˈrændəm/ us

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happening, done, or chosen by chance rather than following a system, plan, or rule:

random audits/checks/tests They discussed the idea of carrying out random forensic audits on listed companies as a deterrent to fraud.

The questionnaires are assigned on a random basis.

at random

without involving any system or decision:

chosen/drawn/selected at random The winner will be the first complete entry drawn at random after the closing date.

(Definition of random from the Cambridge Business English Dictionary © Cambridge University Press)

Examples of random

random

The empirical evidence shows that for some countries we can reject the hypothesis that exchange rates are random walks.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The distribution of the random values is not very important, perceptually.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

More examples Fewer examples

The results were indistinguishable from the random group.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

A secondary problem is that mapping excludes random variables, which by definition are not interface parameters.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Then, the notes pass through a speedlim object, which receives a random timing between 100 to 400 ms at every note input.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The starting point for each part is either a random or a previously stored sound.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The signs in front of the random variables represent the agents' movements in and out of each group.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

More important than the first-order approximation are the random fluctuations around the deterministic trajectory of the delay equation.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The stability result (i) says that the evolution of the capital intensity is uniquely determined by the random fixed point.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The same sequence of r random numbers has been applied to all computations.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Now that we can differentiate systematic non-proportionality from the effects of random error and lumpiness, let us look again at the issue of proportional allocations.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

A second relevant concern here is whether we can treat the 901 respondents in our sample as a random subset of all survey participants.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The model assumes constant tectonic subsidence and a random variation in sea level.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Such correlated random walk models have been studied and applied to biological modeling [9, 10, 12].

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The annular inpainting domain is initially inpainted with a random guess for the iterative strategy (2.12) or (2.13).

From the Cambridge English Corpus

See all examples of random

These examples are from corpora and from sources on the web. Any opinions in the examples do not represent the opinion of the Cambridge Dictionary editors or of Cambridge University Press or its licensors.

Translations of random

in Chinese (Traditional)

任意的, 隨機的, 胡亂的…

Meaning of random in English

Related word

random | American Dictionary

randomly

randomness

random | Business English

Examples of random

Translations of random

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