estimate
Americanverb (used with object)
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estimates,
present (3rd person singular)
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estimated,
past participle, past
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estimating
present participle
verb (used without object)
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estimates,
present (3rd person singular)
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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:
Lofty yields are the draw: Funds in this space commonly estimate an annualized rate in the 10% to 15% range, according to Zachary Evens, a manager research analyst at Morningstar.
From MarketWatch ● Sep. 18, 2026
The close-up observations also helped researchers estimate the size and energy of the object that created McGetchin.
From Science Daily ● Sep. 18, 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
Chemical analysis of one of Thomas’s fossilized teeth has provided the most precise estimate yet of T. rex’s body temperature.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 16, 2026
Sancho and Master Peter made an estimate of the damage, and Don Quixote paid every last bit of it.
From "Adventures of Don Quixote" by Argentina Palacios
Altadena Green estimates that west Altadena lost roughly 70% of its tree canopy in the Eaton fire, and the losses haven’t stopped, with developers and homeowners continuing to clear what’s left.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 19, 2026
Earlier this week, the Pentagon told Congress that the cost of the war has climbed to $42 billion, a bit over the most recent estimates of $38 billion from the Congressional Budget Office.
From Salon ● Sep. 19, 2026
Industrial capacity utilization held steady at 76.3% in August, a tick below estimates and 3.1 percentage points below its long-run average.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 18, 2026
In New Orleans, a federal contractor told MarketWatch that the condo he paid $90,000 for in 2005 would fetch at most $110,000 two decades on if he were to sell, per his estimates.
From MarketWatch ● Sep. 18, 2026
He offered us 400 guilders for our chest; in our opinion, the other estimates are also too low.
From "The Diary of a Young Girl" by Anne Frank
The band's 38-date tour marks the next phase of their comeback following their acclaimed 2025 live reunion, which made an estimated £300 million.
From BBC ● Sep. 18, 2026
The NIL market will reach an estimated $4.5 billion for the 2026-2027 school year, according to Opendorse, which connects athletes with brands and tracks endorsement trends.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 18, 2026
That’s certainly true if, like Kelce, you have made an estimated $120 million or more playing professional football.
From MarketWatch ● Sep. 18, 2026
In 12 months, she estimated, he’d lost two-thirds of his body weight.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 18, 2026
The 7.0-magnitude earthquake and its fifty-two aftershocks killed an estimated 316,000 Haitians, injured 300,000, and instantly made more than a million people homeless.
From "Mountains Beyond Mountains" by Tracy Kidder and Michael French
Even there, the population is small, with the most recent survey estimating just 140 mature individuals.
From Science Daily ● Sep. 14, 2026
A colleague of his, whose job at Anthropic is to lead research about steering and controlling future AI systems, upped the ante, estimating the extinction risk over the next decade is greater than 10%.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 11, 2026
Asking not to be named in fear for the safety of relatives, they said mourning rituals were being held, estimating that at least 24 people had died.
From Barron's ● Sep. 1, 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.
