urgency

English

Alternative forms

• urgence (archaic)

Etymology

From urgent +‎ -ency^[1][2] or Latin urgentia.^[1]

Pronunciation

• (UK, General Australian) IPA^(key): /ˈɜː.d͡ʒən.si/

  • Audio (Southern England):

    (file)

• (US, Canada) IPA^(key): /ˈɝ.d͡ʒən.si/
• Rhymes: -ɜː(ɹ)dʒənsi

Noun

urgency (countable and uncountable, plural urgencies)

1. The quality or condition of being urgent.

   the urgency of a demand

   • 2011 September 24, David Ornstein, “Arsenal 3 - 0 Bolton”, in BBC Sport‎:

     Arsenal lacked urgency and inspiration until shortly before half-time, Wheater's block denying Van Persie from close range before Walcott drilled wide.

2. Insistence, pressure, urge.

   I have this sudden urgency to use the toilet.

3. (medicine) A sudden and compelling need to urinate that is difficult to defer, associated with conditions such as urinary tract infections and overactive bladder.

Synonyms

• exigency
• clamancy

Translations

quality or condition of being urgent

Bulgarian: спешност (bg) f (spešnost) Catalan: urgència (ca) f Chinese: Mandarin: 緊迫／紧迫 (zh) (jǐnpò) Czech: naléhavost f Esperanto: urĝeco Finnish: kiireellisyys (fi) French: urgence (fr) f Galician: urxencia (gl) f German: Dringlichkeit (de) f Greek: επείγον (el) n (epeígon) Ido: urjanteso (io), urjo (io) Indonesian: kêgêntingan Italian: urgenza (it) f, urgenze (it) f pl Ladino: urjensia f Latin: exigentia f Macedonian: и́тност f (ítnost) Persian: اورژانس (fa) Portuguese: urgência (pt) Romanian: urgență (ro) f Russian: сро́чность (ru) f (sróčnostʹ) Spanish: urgencia (es) f, premura, apremio (es) m, perentoriedad f Telugu: తొందర (te) (tondara) Turkish: aciliyet (tr), ivedilik (tr)

References

1. “urgency, n.”, in OED Online ⁠, Oxford, Oxfordshire: Oxford University Press, launched 2000.
2. Douglas Harper (2001–2024) “urgency (n.)”, in Online Etymology Dictionary.

• “urgency”, in Lexico, Dictionary.com; Oxford University Press, 2019–2022.