widespread

/ˌwaɪdˌˈsprɛd/

/ˈwaɪdsprɛd/

Widespread means far-reaching. For years, email was used only by computer programmers and technophiles. It was hard to imagine, back then, how widespread the phenomenon of digital communication would become.

An idea that's widespread, is believed by many people, even if it's not true. A person such as Oprah, Gandhi, or Beyoncé, who has widespread popularity, is loved by many far and wide. A widespread disease is one that many people have — the flu epidemic of 1919 was deadly and widespread.

Definitions of widespread

1. adjective

   widely circulated or diffused
   “a widespread doctrine”

   “widespread fear of nuclear war”

   synonyms:

   general

   applying to all or most members of a category or group
2. adjective

   distributed over a considerable extent
   “widespread nuclear fallout”

   synonyms: far-flung

   distributed

   spread out or scattered about or divided up