myriad
Americannoun
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myriads
plural
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a very great or indefinitely great number of persons or things.
-
ten thousand.
adjective
noun
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(also used in plural) a large indefinite number
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archaic ten thousand
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of myriad
First recorded in 1545–55; from Greek mȳriad-, stem of mȳriás “ten thousand,” from mȳríos “countless”
Explanation
A myriad is a lot of something. If you’re talking about Ancient Greece, a myriad is ten thousand, but today you can use the word in myriad other ways. Myriad comes from the Greek myrioi, the word for ten thousand, or less specifically, a countless amount. Myriad can be a noun, like a myriad of choices, or an adjective, like when you study myriad subjects in college. If you lift a rock you might find a myriad of bugs. Sticklers often look down their noses at using myriad as a noun, but that usage came first.
Vocabulary lists containing myriad
Lord of the Flies
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Grade 10, List 2
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The Old Man and the Sea
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Growing up, I always thought I was carrying around myriad health problems, but this year, I discovered they were all connected to my bendy joints.
From BBC ● Aug. 27, 2026
Stories about his displeasure with that challenge are myriad, but final cut’s result is stunning, and not merely for the visuals.
From Salon ● Aug. 26, 2026
Yet that has some worried that investors might be too complacent for their own good in the face of myriad risks.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 13, 2026
Lawyers, accountants, city officials—and The Wall Street Journal—are wading through myriad questions about the tax and the rollout so far.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 11, 2026
Within were three long hooded cloaks made from myriad small squares of cloth sewn together, three cudgels, three shortswords, three masks of polished brass.
From "A Dance with Dragons" by George R. R. Martin
“Beyond healthcare, this fusion of nanotechnology and cells can lead to unique living hybrid robots, opening up myriads of interesting applications.”
From Salon ● Dec. 15, 2023
Over the centuries, many observers hypothesized that the Milky Way’s soft luminescence was the collective glow from myriads of stars that were too faint and close together in the sky to be individually distinguished.
From Scientific American ● Aug. 4, 2023
Stacking one’s few belongings in a safe place, trying to understand what is yelled in German, Russian, Ukrainian, looking into myriads of unknown faces, worried faces, some smiling faces.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 11, 2022
"Above all I want to thank those myriads of unassuming folk who have shown what love in action can achieve."
From BBC ● Dec. 24, 2021
And Ethir Anduin he saw, the mighty delta of the River, and myriads of sea-birds whirling like a white dust in the sun, and beneath them a green and silver sea, rippling in endless lines.
From "The Fellowship of the Ring" by J.R.R. Tolkien
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
