cumulative
Americanadjective
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increasing or growing by accumulation or successive additions.
the cumulative effect of one rejection after another.
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formed by or resulting from accumulation or the addition of successive parts or elements.
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of or relating to interest or dividends that, if not paid when due, become a prior claim for payment in the future.
cumulative preferred stocks.
adjective
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growing in quantity, strength, or effect by successive additions or gradual steps
cumulative pollution
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gained by or resulting from a gradual building up
cumulative benefits
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finance
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(of preference shares) entitling the holder to receive any arrears of dividend before any dividend is distributed to ordinary shareholders
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(of dividends or interest) intended to be accumulated if not paid when due
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statistics
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(of a frequency) including all values of a variable either below or above a specified value
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(of error) tending to increase as the sample size is increased
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Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of cumulative
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How does cumulative compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:
Explanation
The adjective cumulative describes the total amount of something when it's all added together. Eating a single chocolate doughnut is fine, but the cumulative effect of eating them all day is that you'll probably feel sick. The origin of cumulative is helpful in remembering the meaning; it comes from the Latin cumulatus for "to heap." If something is cumulative, it is heaped together so it can be counted up to get a total number. The cumulative snowfall for the whole winter isn't just the amount of snow that fell in one month, but rather the number of inches that fell every month that winter to get the total, cumulative, amount.
Vocabulary lists containing cumulative
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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.
The estimated cumulative total estimated fire emissions "still remain lower than in 2015," Mark Parrington, senior scientist at Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service told AFP.
From Barron's ● Oct. 15, 2026
Spurs also finished behind City in the Premier League table six times, with the cumulative prize money difference worth £6.6m.
From BBC ● Oct. 13, 2026
The mission to locate Seibert took more than 300 cumulative hours from 20 members of the volunteer rescue team, as well as the support of several outside state and local agencies.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 9, 2026
We all take chances, sometimes without thinking about the cumulative risk.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 5, 2026
But the cumulative effect was a fundamental transformation in the nature of our knowledge of the physical world, the invention of science.
From "The Invention of Science" by David Wootton
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Get a wordDefinitions 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.
