parallelogram
Americannoun
noun
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of parallelogram
First recorded in 1560–70; from Late Latin parallēlogrammum, from Greek parallēlógrammon; equivalent to parallel + -o- + -gram 1
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How does parallelogram compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:
Explanation
A parallelogram is a four-sided object that has parallel opposite sides. A square is a parallelogram. If you take the square and tilt it to one side, it’s still a parallelogram as long as its lines remain parallel. A parallelogram is a two-dimensional object that you might have already encountered in geometry class. You can recognize a parallelogram by its parallel opposite sides, and also by its opposite angles that are equal. Adjacent angles on a parallelogram always add up to 180 degrees. If the angles of a parallelogram are 90 degrees, then it’s straight up and down, like a square or a rectangle.
Vocabulary lists containing parallelogram
Geometry - Introductory
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The ACT Math Test: Geometry, List 2
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Geometry - Middle School
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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:
To build the lantern, the team began with a thin polymer sheet cut into a diamond-shaped parallelogram.
From Science Daily ● Oct. 11, 2025
For this step, in Schwartz’s 2021 paper, he incorrectly concluded that this shape was a parallelogram.
From Scientific American ● Sep. 12, 2023
Now, we have to get it square since at this point it’s probably a parallelogram, not a right rectangle!
From Seattle Times ● Dec. 12, 2022
First, they glued together two opposing sides of the parallelogram, forming a cylinder with two red dots: one on the top and one on the bottom.
From Scientific American ● Sep. 26, 2022
A child’s rubber slippers lay pigeon-toed in the bright parallelogram of barred sunlight on the floor.
From "The God of Small Things" by Arundhati Roy
The famous Miura fold, developed by Japanese astrophysicist Kōryō Miura, folds a sheet of material into parallelograms, allowing it to fold down very compactly.
From BBC ● Mar. 3, 2026
You can also hear the shape of parallelograms and acute trapezoids, according to a 2015 paper by Rowlett and Zhiqin Lu, a mathematician at the University of California, Irvine.
From Scientific American ● Jun. 28, 2022
They handed us a trophy as silver confetti rained down, great clouds of delicate parallelograms.
From The New Yorker ● Apr. 1, 2019
See Figure 9 for a visual that compares vector addition and vector subtraction using parallelograms.
From Textbooks ● Feb. 13, 2015
The drawing room which had transfixed Cecilia that morning with its parallelograms of light was now in gloom, lit by a single lamp near the fireplace.
From "Atonement" by Ian McEwan
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.
