stringent

adjective strin·gent \ ˈstrin-jənt \

Updated on: 24 Apr 2018

1 : tight, constricted

2 : marked by rigor, strictness, or severity especially with regard to rule or standard

stringent decontamination procedures

3 : marked by money scarcity and credit strictness

a stringent budget

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stringently

adverb

See stringent defined for English-language learners

See stringent defined for kids

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Examples of stringent in a Sentence

stringent rules against unauthorized persons being in the building
“You’d need top grades for that,” said professor McGonagall, extracting a small, dark leaflet from under the mass on her desk and opening it. “They ask for a minimum of five N.E.W.T.s, and nothing under ‘Exceeds Expectations’ grade, I see. Then you would be required to undergo a stringent series of character and aptitude tests at the Auror office. It’s a difficult career path, Potter; they only take the best. In fact, I don’t think anybody has been taken on in the last three years.” —“Career Advice” P. 662, HARRY POTTER AND THE ORDER OF THE PHOENIX, J. K. Rowling, Scholastic Press, Scholastic Inc., ©2003
Waugh was by then an established novelist, known for such stringent satires as Vile Bodies, Black Mischief, and his other work of the 1930s, and for Brideshead Revisited—all of which are far better known in the United States than Sword of Honour, his masterpiece. —"Books & Critics" P. 128, Penelope Lively, THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY Vol. 287 No. 2, February 2001
Throughout Canada and the United States, a beneficiary who is convicted in a criminal court proceeding of intentionally murdering the insured is disqualified from receiving life insurance policy proceeds. In many states and throughout Canada, a beneficiary who is convicted of a lesser offense––such as manslaughter––is also disqualified from receiving policy proceeds. Laws in Quebec are even more stringent; a beneficiary who attempts to kills the insured––even if that attempt is unsuccessful––is prohibited from receiving life insurance policy proceeds. —"Chapter Fourteen" P. 276, PRINCIPLES OF INSURANCE: LIFE, HEALTH, AND ANNUITIES, Harriett E. Jones, JD, FLMI, ACS et al., LOMA 1996
Ellison argued in his essay “What America Would Be Like Without Blacks” that blacks, constitutive of Americanness rather than candidates for it, are the moral center of America’s complex hybrid culture. They push democratic culture toward fruition, with the most obvious test being “the inclusion—not assimilation—of the black man.” America “could not survive being deprived of their presence because, by the irony implicit in the dynamics of American democracy, they symbolize both its most stringent testing and the possibility of its greatest human freedom,” he wrote. Toni Morrison’s best-selling book of essays, Playing in the Dark, can be read as an extended meditation on Ellison’s belief in the centrality of African-Americans for American literature. “The presence of black people is inherent, along with gender and family ties, in the earliest lesson every child is taught regarding his or her distinctiveness,” she writes. “Africanism is inextricable from the definition of Americanness.” Ellison wrote, “Whatever else the true American is, he is also somehow black.” —“The New Intellectuals” P. 67, Robert S. Boynton, THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY Vol. 275 No. 3, March 1995

Recent Examples of stringent from the Web

Also last month, a crowd of about 100 students at Canyon High School in New Braunfels held their own rally outside the school to call for more stringent gun laws.

— lauren caruba, San Antonio Express-News, "Hundreds of San Antonio students plan to join ‘National School Walkout’," 19 Apr. 2018
The stringent law has prompted many to join the fight to restore voting rights.

— perry chiaramonte | fox news, Fox News, "Florida felons are latest point of contention in fight for battleground state's votes," 19 Apr. 2018
Compared to these stringent standards of oversight, the measures Facebook has undertaken to date are not nearly enough.

— justin choi, Philly.com, "Hey Mark Zuckerberg: A software CEO describes how Facebook can fix its ugly ad problem," 10 Apr. 2018
The coalition of states led by California, which had sought more stringent standards, agreed to set its requirements at the same levels.

— justin worland, Time, "Carmakers Wanted President Trump to Ease Emission Standards. Now They're Afraid He'll Go Too Far," 2 Apr. 2018
Over the years, stringent laws were put into place to deter the practice.

— NBC News, "Violence erupts in India as lowest caste protests Supreme Court order," 2 Apr. 2018
Today, roughly one-third of Americans live in states that opted for California’s stringent standards.

— laurent belsie, The Christian Science Monitor, "Trump's challenge to fuel-efficient car standards: an uphill battle," 3 Apr. 2018
Ironically, the foundation’s inability to secure the land was due to India’s stringent land-use laws.

— win mccormack, The New Republic, "Outside the Limits of the Human Imagination," 27 Mar. 2018
On Thursday, two members of Parliament declined to walk through a metal detector, saying the law was being enforced in a partisan fashion, with members of some parties subjected to more stringent checks.

— andrew e. kramer, New York Times, "Now Prohibited in Ukraine’s Parliamentary Chamber: Weapons," 22 Mar. 2018

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

How Should You Use stringent?

Words that are synonymous with stringent include rigid, which implies uncompromising inflexibility ("rigid rules of conduct"), and rigorous, which suggests hardship and difficulty ("the rigorous training of firefighters"). Also closely related is strict, which emphasizes undeviating conformity to rules, standards, or requirements ("strict enforcement of the law"). Stringent usually involves severe, tight restrictions or limitations ("the college has stringent admissions rules"). That's logical. After all, rigorous and rigid are both derived from rigēre, the Latin word meaning "to be stiff," and stringent and strict developed from the Latin verb stringere, meaning "to bind tight."