1
: involving or causing some loss of data
Lossy compression is a way of getting even smaller squeezed files than lossless. This technology strips out data it has been programmed to regard as either unnecessary or redundant.—
Ron Goldberg
Ron GoldbergThe loss was literal: MP3 is what's called a "lossy" data-compression form of audio encoding; some audio information is demonstrably lost in the process.—Virginia Heffernan
Virginia Heffernan2
: causing attenuation or dissipation of electrical energy
a lossy transmission line
a lossy dielectric
Examples of lossy in a Sentence
Recent Examples on the Web
In this approach, an LLM is paired with a true knowledge base—such as an organization’s document archive or customer data—to deliver accurate, up-to-date information without the discrepancies of a purely generative, lossy model.
—Victor Shilo, Forbes, 20 Feb. 2025
This is a lossy process that can produce more dull colors.
—Eric Ravenscraft, WIRED, 3 Aug. 2024
This technology enables wireless playback in CD quality with no lossy compression.
—Mark Sparrow, Forbes, 27 Mar. 2024
This way of distributing power is fundamentally lossy.
—Brian Cline, IEEE Spectrum, 26 Aug. 2021
Things like cropping, flipping or rotating, adding a filter, changing the brightness, color, or contrast, or using a lossy compression algorithm won’t remove a watermark from an image—or at least, not so much that SynthID can’t still detect it.
—Harry Guinness, Popular Science, 30 Aug. 2023
The fact that Xerox photocopiers use a lossy compression format instead of a lossless one isn’t, in itself, a problem.
—Ted Chiang, The New Yorker, 9 Feb. 2023
While the lossless Huffman algorithm is a part of the JPEG process, overall the standard is lossy.
—Quanta Magazine, 31 May 2023
Death is a lossy process, but something always remains.
—Paul Ford, WIRED, 15 June 2023
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Victor Shilo, Forbes, 20 Feb. 2025
This is a lossy process that can produce more dull colors.
—Eric Ravenscraft, WIRED, 3 Aug. 2024
This technology enables wireless playback in CD quality with no lossy compression.
—Mark Sparrow, Forbes, 27 Mar. 2024
This way of distributing power is fundamentally lossy.
—Brian Cline, IEEE Spectrum, 26 Aug. 2021
Things like cropping, flipping or rotating, adding a filter, changing the brightness, color, or contrast, or using a lossy compression algorithm won’t remove a watermark from an image—or at least, not so much that SynthID can’t still detect it.
—Harry Guinness, Popular Science, 30 Aug. 2023
The fact that Xerox photocopiers use a lossy compression format instead of a lossless one isn’t, in itself, a problem.
—Ted Chiang, The New Yorker, 9 Feb. 2023
While the lossless Huffman algorithm is a part of the JPEG process, overall the standard is lossy.
—Quanta Magazine, 31 May 2023
Death is a lossy process, but something always remains.
—Paul Ford, WIRED, 15 June 2023
Cite this Entry
“Lossy.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/lossy. Accessed 4 Mar. 2025.
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