self-critical

adjective

self-crit·​i·​cal ˌself-ˈkri-ti-kəl 

: inclined to find fault with oneself : critical of oneself

a self-critical perfectionist

… helping patients identify and challenge pessimistic or self-critical thoughts that cause or perpetuate depression.

—Mary A. Whooley

Examples of self-critical in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

The upshot of Yale’s report, which is by far the most self-critical of the three, is that administrators bear much of the responsibility for higher education’s current predicament. — Rose Horowitch, The Atlantic, 27 June 2026

This is not about being hyper self-critical, by the way. — Cynthia Pong, Forbes.com, 14 June 2026

The comment comes as AWS prepares to publish what may be the most substantive piece of self-critical research to emerge from a major cloud provider this year. — Nick Lichtenberg, Fortune, 8 June 2026

Should Arsenal suffer the double disappointment of missing out on the Premier League and Champions League, the highly self-critical Spaniard may have doubts over whether to continue. — James McNicholas, New York Times, 5 May 2026

Sensitive and self-critical at times, this zodiac sign is deeply aware of how others perceive them — qualities that mirror her portrayal of Cassie Howard. — Valerie Mesa, PEOPLE, 13 Apr. 2026

Claude is predicted to be morally aware, conscientious and able to be self-critical. — Nate Anderson, ArsTechnica, 9 Apr. 2026

And was obviously very talented and very intelligent to do so serious and self-critical work, which was really a breakthrough in this field. — Mariel Carr, Scientific American, 20 Mar. 2026

That self-critical instinct has been a constant across his career. — Naman Ramachandran, Variety, 20 Mar. 2026

Word History

First Known Use

1841, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for self-critical

• levitical
• noncritical
• political
• subcritical
• uncritical
• analytical
• apolitical
• diacritical
• hypercritical
• hypocritical
• nonpolitical
• parasitical