She is minute in the volleyball team

[kachibibb]

"Minute" means very small.

Can I use it to describe one's body size?

She is 150cm tall. She is too minute for the volleyball team.

 

[Skrej]

We wouldn't normally use 'minute' as a synonym for small or short in that context, but if you were trying to exaggerate how short she was for humorous effect, then it might work. Otherwise it just sounds strange.

 

[kachibibb]

What is the more natural way of saying so?

 

[Rover_KE]

She's not tall enough for the volleyball team.

She's too short to play volleyball.

 

[Tdol]

You might be able to say that she's not small, she's minute, but too minute for volleyball doesn't work for me. It's trying too hard when simply stating the case that she isn't tall enough/is too short does the job better.

 

[kachibibb]

So it is still natural to say a person is minute meaning that he/she is small in body size.

But only not natural when adding "too" to it?

 

[slevlife]

No, nobody here said that. The cases given for where it might be appropriate were if you were exaggerating for humorous effect, or if you used the specific contrasting phrase “she’s not small, she’s minute” (in other words, she’s smaller than small).

If you want to focus on overall body size rather than only one aspect like height, weight, or mass, you could use words like “small,” “tiny,” or (for women) “petite.” But we don’t normally call people “minute.”

This extends beyond the usage of “minute” for describing people. “Minute” can definitely be used to describe genuinely tiny physical size, but otherwise, I think it’s significantly more common to use it for a small amount, extent, or degree of something.