estimate
Americanverb (used with object)
-
estimates,
present (3rd person singular)
-
estimated,
past participle, past
-
estimating
present participle
verb (used without object)
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estimates,
present (3rd person singular)
-
estimated,
past participle, past
-
estimating
present participle
noun
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estimates
plural
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an approximate judgment or calculation, as of the value, amount, time, size, or weight of something.
- Synonyms:
- appraisal, calculation, valuation
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a judgment or opinion, as of the qualities of a person or thing.
-
a statement of the approximate charge for work to be done, submitted by a person or business firm ready to undertake the work.
verb
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to form an approximate idea of (distance, size, cost, etc); calculate roughly; gauge
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(tr; may take a clause as object) to form an opinion about; judge
to estimate one's chances
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to submit (an approximate price) for (a job) to a prospective client
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(tr) statistics to assign a value (a point estimate ) or range of values (an interval estimate ) to a parameter of a population on the basis of sampling statistics See estimator
noun
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an approximate calculation
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a statement indicating the likely charge for or cost of certain work
-
a judgment; appraisal; opinion
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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estimatornoun
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preestimatenoun
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reestimatenoun
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self-estimatenoun
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preestimateverb (used with object)
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reestimateverb (used with object)
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estimativeadjective
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unestimatedadjective
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well-estimatedadjective
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estimatinglyadverb
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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estimatesimple
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estimatessimple
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have estimatedperfect
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has estimatedperfect
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am estimatingprogressive
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are estimatingprogressive
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is estimatingprogressive
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have been estimatingperfect progressive
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has been estimatingperfect progressive
Past
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estimatedsimple
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had estimatedperfect
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was estimatingprogressive
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were estimatingprogressive
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had been estimatingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of estimate
First recorded in 1525–35; from Latin aestimātus “valued,” past participle of aestimāre “to value, fix the value of”
Explanation
A rough calculation or appraisal is an estimate. When you hit another baseball through the kitchen window, your parents will get an estimate of the repair costs. And you should estimate being grounded for approximately 3 weeks. An estimate is kind of like a very educated guess. Making an estimate takes good evaluation skills, and usually estimates are pretty close to the actual outcome. If the garage bill is way higher than the estimate they gave you, for example, you have a right to be angry. But if you forgot to factor in rush hour traffic when you estimated the drive from Boston to New York, that's your own fault.
Vocabulary lists containing estimate
Jim Burke's Academic Vocabulary List
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Arithmetic
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Tax Day Words
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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:
Researchers estimate that an impact this large may occur on the Moon only about once every century, or even less frequently.
From Science Daily ● Sep. 18, 2026
“I recently saw a deal fall apart over a $40,000 repair estimate from the buyer’s inspection,” he said.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 17, 2026
The consensus estimate among analysts polled by FactSet is for Uber’s 2026 revenue to total $57.8 billion, up 55% from $37.3 billion in 2023.
From MarketWatch ● Sep. 17, 2026
The Welsh government's latest estimate, external is that it would require between £250m and £500m of extra funding a year, depending on how many parents make use of the scheme.
From BBC ● Sep. 16, 2026
I estimate the water temperature to be approximately four degrees Centigrade at this time of year.
From "Salt to the Sea" by Ruta Sepetys
By most estimates, the pipeline was the conduit for about 3 million to 4 million barrels a day of crude before it shut down last week.
From MarketWatch ● Sep. 17, 2026
A similar storm today would cause hundreds of billions in property damage, according to insurers’ estimates.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 17, 2026
Without collecting race and ethnicity data in the census, these estimates could not be produced, needlessly wasting resources and endangering lives.
From Slate ● Sep. 17, 2026
Osborne said the sport can be "very lonely" - she estimates she drives 65,000 miles a year, often alone - and she has suffered some serious falls, breaking numerous bones.
From BBC ● Sep. 17, 2026
He was sixty-eight and a widower twice over; she was in her twenties—no one knew exactly where in her twenties, but estimates put her between twenty-one and twenty-seven years old.
From "The Devil in the White City" by Erik Larson
It has recovered tens of millions of pounds, but still faces an estimated shortfall of £16.8m.
From BBC ● Sep. 18, 2026
To increase Meta’s earnings per share by roughly 20%, Oppenheimer estimated that the company would have to gather 115 million Muse subscribers paying $20 a month—about double the number of paying subscribers of OpenAI’s ChatGPT.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 18, 2026
India's semiconductor market has expanded from $38 billion in 2023 to an estimated $45-$50 billion in 2024-25, with government targets of $100-$110 billion by 2030.
From Barron's ● Sep. 17, 2026
The Mizuho analysts estimated that the U.S. trading-card market was close to $10 billion to $20 billion in size.
From MarketWatch ● Sep. 17, 2026
The final number is estimated at more than two hundred thousand.
From "At Last She Stood" by Erin Entrada Kelly
Even there, the population is small, with the most recent survey estimating just 140 mature individuals.
From Science Daily ● Sep. 14, 2026
Anthropic safety executive Evan Hubinger chimed in on X, estimating the risk at more than 10 percent over the next decade.
From Barron's ● Sep. 11, 2026
Even meteorologists estimating cooling demand gains over the holiday weekend acknowledge cooler weather in the 11-15 day window, he adds.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 8, 2026
But this is potentially the largest relief plan to date, with the state tax board estimating it would make more than $40 million available to newsrooms annually.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 29, 2026
The friends also did slightly better than the dorm room visitors at accurately estimating agreeableness—how helpful and trusting someone is.
From "Blink" by Malcolm Gladwell
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.
