Webster's New World College Dictionary, Fifth Edition

You should always write (and read) with a good dictionary at hand, and a having a physical dictionary is best for anyone writing on a computer with access to the internet, i.e., 99 percent of us. It saves you from distractions ("Think I'll check my email now that I'm online") and at least half the joy of a dictionary is the words you stumble on when looking up your targeted word.
Unfortunately, this dictionary falls short of its predecessors in a few ways. They got rid of the lettered tabs. Granted, they never seemed to get you to where you wanted to be that much faster, but they gave the book a traditional look and if you have similar size reference books nearby you could grab the dictionary without having to think about it even a little because it stood out. That's minor. The major problem is they shrunk the type size. The demographic is going to skew a little old and that means people who need reading glasses. The beauty of computers is that you can adjust the screen so you can put away your readers and write, and with the old dictionary you could make things out without them, provided the lighting was good enough. Not anymore. The type is tiny. Sure, it's a huge book at 1,700 pages, but would bumping the size up a little and adding fifty pages to it as a result really have made it that much more unwieldy? No.

the 2010 Oxford American Dictionary @ $33.75 is distinguished;
the 2011 American Heritage Dictionary @ $40.45 is excellent;
this 2014 Fifth Edition of Webster's New World College Dictionary @ $16.41 is The Very Best.
there is a word for it: nonpareil.
¶ one of its distinctive features: each of > 12,000 entries is identified (by a preceding *)
as an Americanism. individually and collectively, these yield telling insights.
¶ some other reviewers here have pointed out, correctly, that the printing in this book is small --
perhaps too small for some elder eyes. But there are already some 1,700 pages here,
and significantly enlarging the print would significantly increase that number.
¶ It may be that future dictionaries of this quality will need to come in two volumes, A - M, N - Z.

1. I didn't realize this fifth edition was not thumb-indexed (maybe there is none) as is the fourth.

2. The typeface for word definitions is smaller and lighter than that of the fourth. They're hardly readable.
The same for the 'word' entry--smaller and lighter than that of the fourth, although readable. I returned this edition.

3. I will forgo the 'more than 4,700 entries and senses [that] have been added', and the 'tens of thousands of revisions [that] have been made to existing senses to reflect current usage', and continue to use my thumb-indexed readable fourth edition.

NEW IS NOT BETTER; BE WARNED.

The list below are things NOT found in this "new" dictionary.

Not as great as my 1977 Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary. My 1977 has more things things in it I just love
A 1977 Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary includes:
-Very long "Explanatory Notes" on the English language,
-The History of English,
-Tabular Hisry of the English Language,
-when you go to "Braile" in the Dictionary....it shows you the Braille alphabet,
-when you look up "Indo-European Languages"--it gives you a chart form them in Ancient, Medieval, Modern.
-when you look up "Semapore", it shows you the semaphore alphabet
-when you look up Weights and Measures, there is a HUGE chart of all weights/meausres and equivalents
-pages of "Foreign Words and Phrases"
-pages of "Biographical Names"
-pages of "Geographical Names"
-pages of "Colleges and Universities"
-pages of "'Signs and Symbols" in Astronomy, Biology, Business, Chemestry, Flow chart, Mathematics, Medicine, Misc, Physics, Referance marks, stamps and stamp collection, Weather
-"Hand book of style" pages.
-"Forms of Address" when writing letters to people
-Examples of how to type "Style in Business Correspondence" (Block, Modified Block, Modified Semi-Block, Indented.

This is just a simple dictionary. Words defined very simply--almost elementary school level. I was really disapointed when I looked through this book--it's just not enriching enough to be a go-to referance book/dictionary.

I long have used the Webster's New World Dictionary of American English, the most recommendable and comprehensive of its variants being any designated for "college" (in U.S.A. lingo including "university") use. Having just received the new Fifth Edition ("new" in this year of 2014) causes me to ponder the unbroken excellence of every edition of this great American dictionary. The edition which most people usually think of as the first one of this dictionary was the only English dictionary which students at the college where I did my freshman and sophomore years of study, in the mid-1960s, were permitted to cite as their lexical authority (the then recently debased "Collegiate" dictionary from Merriam-Webster, having been prime among the dictionaries that students were forbidden to use in writing their papers and assignments).

By the time of its Fifth Edition, the Webster's New World Dictionary has become so compendious, so hefty, that it now barely fits the format of a single volume dictionary. The Fourth Edition already had been "groaning at the seams". To accommodate what appears surely to be a larger base of vocabulary of terms, abbreviations, names, etc. (the totals of which the dictionary's introductory features themselves do not quantify explicitly, unless something has eluded my glance), the Fifth Edition (comparing it here only to the Fourth Edition), even though it has decreased slightly in pagination, has cut out some extraneous (albeit useful) features from the "Reference Supplement", and has decreased slightly (but noticeably) the print size in the main bulk of the work. To limit the comparison to the main paging sequence between the two most recent editions, one goes from the Fourth's 1716 p. to the Fifth's total of 1703 p. The "Reference Supplement" at the end of the Fifth Edition has dropped some features which orient specifically to the United States and which were found in the Fourth Edition's more numerous sub-sections therein (e.g., among such omissions are the texts of national U.S. documents; tables of population and of some other data about American, Canadian, and Mexican cities; as well as some other matter); what remains has more universal application and is less susceptible to fall out-of-date too quickly.

Most readers, of course, now have access to the multitude of data of nearly all sorts on the World Wide Web and elsewhere on the Internet, and, if they do not have such cyber-access to the information in this dictionary's "Reference Supplement", they can find information of the kind readily and more appropriately in printed almanacs, in other books of "vade mecum" nature, in gazetteers or atlases, and in single-volume and larger multi-volume cyclopaedic generalist reference works. At least a few such handy works, anyhow, most households really should have within easy reach. If, to continue to augment the inclusion of new words in the dictionary and yet to remain reasonably within the confines of a single volume work, the editors of Webster's New World College Dictionary, in eventual subsequent editions, were to drop entries for most of the names (of persons, places, and the like), in order to opt for still larger inclusion of vocabulary, that would be a wise choice, even if it would be rather counter to what coverage in collegiate dictionaries has tended to be over the years. For now, name entries still appear in the Fifth Edition, so be not alarmed, those who like to have them!

There had been forerunners of the supremely fine Webster's New World Dictionary under the same title, published decades before the 1950s, under the imprint of World Publishers, but those earlier ones did not so deserve to be considered the first edition (which seems to have gone through printings from 1953 to 1968 or so, of which the one that I first obtained was the 1964 printing), the famed Second Edition, completely revised, appearing in 1970. I have acquired and used every edition of this dictionary, right up to and including the Fourth and now the Fifth Editions. There had been, years ago, before any of the College Editions were shortly to begin to appear, a more complete, two-volume "Webster's New World Dictionary of the American Language", published in 1951, but I never have encountered any later multiple-volume edition of the work. I have retained each much-loved, well-used College Edition, keeping them in various rooms of my house, along with some other favoured dictionaries, for ready resort near desks, tables, or armchairs where I most often read or write.

An interesting feature, by the way, of the Second College Edition, at least of the sturdy "Special School Printing" of it which I own, is a flexi-disc (33.3 r.p.m., 7 in.) included with it that bears the title upon it, "New World Phonoguide: an Audio Supplement to the Pronunciation Guide and Phonetic Symbols" which could be of considerable help to users for whom English is a second (third, etc.) language. I have not seen this helpful disc in other editions of this dictionary as I own copies of them. As for the fourth college edition, one or some printing(s) of it come(s) with an accompanying CD-ROM.

Each edition of the Webster's New World Dictionary has improved on the one that preceded it and one can make a good case especially for any of the Third to Fifth Editions as the one preferred for reasons of content or of sheer attractive format, ease, and presentation (the Third Edition being particularly fine in those regards, remaining quite a viable option to choice over the somewhat more austerely cramped pages of the Fifth Edition). Alas, for some dictionaries, decline, rather than consistently genuine improvement, can set in with their later editions. That is so very notably in the case of those benighted "Collegiate" dictionaries from Merriam-Webster, which fell from grace when they began to be based on the excessively permissive Webster's THIRD New International Dictionary (the unabridged dictionary from Merriam-Webster, which had displaced the rock-solid and far more trustworthy Webster's New Twentieth Century Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged SECOND Edition), Earlier and better Merriam-Webster's "Collegiate" dictionary editions formerly and more happily had been based, to such good effect, on the Unabridged Second Edition, which had guaranteed a solid foundation. Similar decay also has beset numerous other dictionaries which have not undergone wise or sufficient revision, leading to the lessening of quality or of reliability as later editions appear, when compared to former ones.

The most admirable (of many good) qualities of the Webster's New World Dictionary is the sane approach to matters of word usage; while this dictionary is "prescriptive" in indicating what pronunciations and definitions are normative, it does give alternate ones that are common but less "proper", so far as American usage is concerned. It includes an healthy amount of words of informal English and slang; unlike the too prim-and-proper Funk and Wagnall dictionaries or the American Heritage Dictionary, both quite fine but rather too staid, the Webster's New World Dictionary does not exclude such words and locutions of less-then-high-pedigree from the lexicon, but, rather, admits them while it very helpfully indicates their level of English usage admissibility or unacceptability for inclusion in formal writing or speaking. Each subsequent edition of the Webster's New World Dictionary, too, has undergone a thorough updating to add new words, technical or otherwise, to the vocabulary of the language.

A single, general-purpose college or desk-reference dictionary, even so admirably aimed at sophisticated adult level as the Webster's New World College Dictionary is, will not suffice to fulfil all requirements. For one thing, a truly unabridged dictionary, usually multi-volume, is good to have around for exceptional needs; I have several such dictionaries, of which, among them, I particularly commend "The Random House Dictionary of the English Language, Unabridged", Second Edition, in one humongous and heavily oversized volume (of xlii, 2478, 32 p.). Also, of dictionaries of solid but modestly single-volume scope, one or a few dictionaries which correspond(s) to Commonwealth usage is (or are) important for non-American readers to possess and to use. Being here in Canada, I tend most to rely upon British dictionaries for spelling (especially Cassell's, Chamber's, and Harrap's fine recent editions of their respective dictionaries) and on specifically Canadian dictionaries (most notably the impeccable Gage dictionaries) for pronunciation or for peculiarly Canadian use and origin, but for definitions, I always have preferred the best American dictionaries, especially the various editions of Webster's New World Dictionary.

The Amazon buyer cannot go wrong in purchasing any variant of the Webster's New World Dictionary. If he cannot afford or find the latest edition, any of the previous "college" editions is quite suitable and reliable for everyday use. Go for it!

I awarded five stars to the 4th edition of this dictionary (Webster's New World) but this new 5th edition misses the high marks of the 4th. The neologisms seem to be adequately covered, and the simple, clear definitions for which Webster's New World takes pride are still here, at least for now. However, the production is a downgrade, with smaller page size and smaller print. Gone are the half-tones (photos) and the superb illustrations of the 4th edition which are now replaced with the less attractive drawings from the 3rd edition. The paper is noticeably lower grade (bulked, non-alkaline) and much of the encyclopedic material (US Constitution, Bill of Rights, color maps, lists of US presidents, Rivers, etc.) has been dropped. (Admittedly, not a big deal for some.)

But I am most disappointed that after careful scrutiny of the book and the Houghton-Mifflin-Harcourt websites I was unable to find any contact information for the offices of Webster's New World reference books. All I could find was contact info to Houghton-Mifflin-Harcourt's corporate office in New York. Webster's New World Dictionary now seems to be a dictionary without a home or even an Internet address that one might send an inquiry to. From this, one might surmise that the former New World Dictionary home offices at 850 Euclid Ave. Cleveland, OH 44114 are no longer, and the dictionary database may now be maintained on line by part-timers from home.

All of the above seems to indicate a corporate decision calling for draconian cost reductions at WNW Dictionary. If so, we are witness to the decline of an American institution, one which for decades drove competing dictionaries to excel. It now remains for the consumer to decide if such extreme cost-cutting measures prove efficacious. No doubt, some of us will insist on a dictionary produced by a trained full-time staff of scholars and lexicographers, one that prides itself on the conscientious monitoring of the English language, not just the occasional insertion of a few new words. For us, there would seem to be better choices. The venerable Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary comes to mind. It is a dictionary with a real address, and a publisher that invites inquiries and suggestions. It may cost a few dollars more (or not), but for those who appreciate its excellence, Merriam-Webster seems clearly a better value.

Pages were paper thin. Print was extremely small and very difficult to read. The print on pages was a grey color that was difficult to read. I do not recommend this purchase. I did return it to amazon for a full refund, which was promptly refunded in full.

The print is sooo small that (even though I need only reading glasses) I can only read the print with a magnifying glass with my reading glasses. I'm going to have to try to retun this item and try a dictionary with "larger" print

Surprisingly, for 2015 I was disappointed with this dictionary. Print is way too small. Pages looks like a copy of a page instead of an original crisp readable page. I would give the printers a "1" on a scale of 1 to 5, The writers do a subtle job of ambiguity with definitions. Synonyms are not given frequently.

This edition does not meet the standards of the previous edition. The print is much too light, and this makes it very difficult read. I wish I had not given up my 14th edition for this one. I will not recommend this edition to anyone.