billion

American  

[bil-yuhn] / ˈbɪl jən /

noun

• billions,
  plural
• billion
  plural

1. a cardinal number represented in the U.S. by 1 followed by 9 zeros, and in Great Britain by 1 followed by 12 zeros.

2. a very large number.

   I've told you so billions of times.

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adjective

1. equal in number to a billion.

billion British  

/ ˈbɪljən /

noun

1. one thousand million: it is written as 1 000 000 000 or 10 ⁹

2. (formerly, in Britain) one million million: it is written as 1 000 000 000 000 or 10 ¹²

3. (often plural) any exceptionally large number

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determiner

1. (preceded by a or a cardinal number)

   1. amounting to a billion

      it seems like a billion years ago

   2. ( as pronoun )

      we have a billion here

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• billionth
  adjective

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• billion
  plural
• billions
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of billion

1680–90; < French, equivalent to b ( i )- bi- ¹ + -illion, as in million

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Compare meaning

How does billion compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:

• billion vs. trillion

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Explanation

A billion is 1,000,000,000. There are over 7 billion people in the world, the last time we checked. While billion may sounds like a made-up number like zillion — which just means a lot — it's a very real number, specifically 1,000,000,000. That's a pretty hard number to imagine, but one way to think of it is as a thousand millions. If you have a billion dollars, you're very rich: a billionaire. Money spent by the government is often measured in billions. In England, this word often refers to a different number: 1,000,000,000,000, or one million millions.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

billion billions

While it reached an all-time high of $31.57 billion in the fourth quarter, this represented growth of just 9.8%, down from 12.1% in the prior quarter.

From MarketWatch ● Nov. 3, 2026

In a statement, Kim Yo Jong said the U.S. was spreading misinformation by pinning the blame on North Korea for both the Binance heist and last year’s Bybit hack of $1.5 billion.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 3, 2026

Previously it predicted a range of between 1.7 and 2.2 billion euros.

From Barron's ● Nov. 3, 2026

It raked in more than $30 billion of free cash flow in its September quarter, when most of Big Tech was sending more cash out the door than it was bringing in.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 3, 2026

Deutsche Bank’s CDO machine paid Hubler the 28 basis points he craved and, in December 2006 and January 2007, cut two deals, of $2 billion each.

From "The Big Short" by Michael Lewis

While not detailing the cost of the revised plans, Mahmood told the BBC the state would still save "billions" because workers in other sectors would have to wait longer.

From BBC ● Nov. 3, 2026

As Chinese military pressure increases, Taiwan is pouring billions of dollars into aerial and sea drones, which have been widely used in Russia's war in Ukraine and in the Strait of Hormuz with devastating effect.

From Barron's ● Nov. 3, 2026

Their surprising similarities, preserved surface characteristics, and unexpected numbers offer important clues about the processes that shaped the planets billions of years ago.

From Science Daily ● Nov. 2, 2026

As for the Venezuela deal, that country’s oil industry is in such a shambles that bringing it back to its peak output will take years and billions of investment dollars.

From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 2, 2026

All those unseen billions and trillions of charged particles, and possibly, she thought, of Dust, conjured a radiating glow out of the upper atmosphere.

From "The Golden Compass" by Philip Pullman

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