episodic

adjective ep·i·sod·ic \ ˌe-pə-ˈsä-dik also -ˈzä- \

variants: or less commonly episodical play \ˌe-pə-ˈsä-di-kəl also -ˈzä-\

Definition of episodic

1 :made up of separate especially loosely connected episodes

2 :having the form of an episode

3 :of or limited in duration or significance to a particular episode :temporary

may be able to establish whether the sea-floor spreading is continuous or episodic
—A. I. Hammond

4 :occurring, appearing, or changing at usually irregular intervals :occasional

an episodic illness

—

episodically

play \ˌe-pə-ˈsä-di-k(ə-)lē also -ˈzä-\ adverb

See episodic defined for English-language learners

Examples of episodic in a Sentence

the long novel was filmed for television as an episodic movie that was shown over the course of five evenings
malaria is characterized by episodic attacks of chills and fever that coincide with mass destruction of blood cells

Recent Examples of episodic from the Web

As the slow-rolling, episodic debacle of Obamacare repeal demonstrates, overlap between the Trump and traditional wings of the Republican Party is not always enough to push a policy over the top.

— david a. graham, The Atlantic, "Trump Is Losing His Battle With the Republican Party," 8 Aug. 2017
Acute stress, on the other hand, decreases neural processing in the frontal lobe, which is involved in retrieving episodic, autobiographical and factual knowledge.

— stefania de vito, Scientific American, "Was Agatha Christie’s Mysterious Amnesia Real or Revenge on Her Cheating Spouse?," 2 Aug. 2017
Game of Thrones: A Telltale Game Series is an episodic video game in the style of Telltale's other offerings, which include games based on popular licenses like The Walking Dead, Batman, and Guardians of the Galaxy.

— scott meslow, GQ, "The Best Game of Thrones Story You Probably Don't Know Yet," 3 July 2017
Nye recently sold a dramatic episodic series called The Vanishing Point to Microsoft for use on its online network, MSN.

— andrew l. shapiro, Daily Intelligencer, "The New Old Media," 30 June 2017
But the episodic structure simply doesn’t mesh together, even in the finale, which attempts to combine the disparate plot lines.

— jon niccum, kansascity.com, "Minion overload? ‘3’ isn’t always a charm for third ‘Despicable Me’," 28 June 2017
Special features include Emme's Island Moments: Memories of Hawaii Five-O, a music video tribute, episodic promos and more.

— nathan paige, cleveland.com, "Recent TV series boxed set releases: 'Bones,' 'The Vampire Diaries,' 'Under the Dome,' 'Hawaii Five-O'," 27 June 2017
After initially pushing short-form video for Facebook Live, the social network is now trying to get publishers to create longer-form, episodic content instead.

— mathew ingram, Fortune, "Why Facebook’s Latest Video Moves Make Some Publishers Nervous," 12 June 2017
Assistant director Vimel Sephus’ often haunting sound design, though, helps to close that gap and bring some unity to the episodic, sometimes hypnotic work.

— james hebert, sandiegouniontribune.com, "'Blacktop' offers glimpses of pain, compassion," 12 June 2017

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'episodic.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.