percentage
Americannoun
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percentages
plural
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a rate or proportion per hundred.
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an allowance, commission, or rate of interest calculated by percent.
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a proportion in general.
Only a small percentage of the class will graduate with honors.
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gain; benefit; profit; advantage.
noun
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proportion or rate per hundred parts
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commerce the interest, tax, commission, or allowance on a hundred items
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any proportion in relation to the whole
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informal profit or advantage
Usage
What is a percentage? Percentage is a rate or proportion per hundred, as in This graph shows the percentage of homes that have a microwave. Percentage is also used more generally to mean any proportion, as in Studies have shown that a large percentage of people love cute animals. A percent is one one-hundredth (1/100) of something. Percentage refers to the rate or proportion of that one hundred. Usually, you will see the word percentage used in math equations or statistics or when someone is measuring the increase and decrease in rates. Informally, percentage can mean a gain or advantage, as in There is no percentage to be gained from lying to the sheriff. Generally, percentage and percent can be used interchangeably when referring to vague proportions. However, the word percentage never follows an exact number. In this case, only percent can be used in The number of pet owners increased by 10 percent. A percentile is any of the possible 100 equal parts a range of values can be divided into. A given percentile means that the percentage of all possible outcomes is lower or lesser than the given percentile. For example, if you score in the 92nd percentile of an exam, you scored higher than 92 percent of all other people who took the exam. Example: After careful measuring, the percentage of people who hated pineapple on pizza was found to be significantly higher than first thought.
Commonly Confused
See percent.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of percentage
Explanation
A percentage is a portion of a whole expressed as a number between 0 and 100 rather than as a fraction. All of something is 100 percent, half of it is fifty percent, none of something is zero percent. To determine a percentage, you divide the portion of the whole by the whole itself and multiply by 100. So if you just ate two pieces of an eight-piece pie, and you want to know what percentage of the pie you consumed, you'd first divide 2 by 8 which equals .25. Then multiply .25 times 100 and get 25 percent. A percentage can also mean a portion of something but only when it has to do with numbers. When you buy furniture, the salesman gets a percentage of what you spend.
Vocabulary lists containing percentage
The SAT: Language of the Test, List 3
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Perfect Ten: Dec, Cent, Mille
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The New SAT: The Language of the Test
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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:
When inflation is low, the index readings tend to range in the 50s and low 60s in percentage terms.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 5, 2026
Refinery runs were forecast to have fallen by half of a percentage point in the Journal survey.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 5, 2026
Despite public and private polling showing double-digit leads for El-Sayed heading into the night, he defeated Stevens by just 1 percentage point.
From Slate ● Aug. 5, 2026
Four percentage points of that growth came from a $100 million tariff refund that quarter, which reversed tariff payments made earlier in the fiscal year, the company said.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 5, 2026
Now let’s look at the win-loss percentage between the 7-7 wrestlers and the 8-6 wrestlers the next time they meet, when neither one is on the bubble.
From "Freakonomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything" by Steven D. Levitt
The company meanwhile said that two of its AI-related divisions grew by "triple-digit percentages" -- its AI cloud and chips businesses each "exceeded" $25 billion annual revenue run rates, a measure of recurring sales.
From Barron's ● Jul. 30, 2026
Generally, an executor is paid — depending on the state — anywhere from 3% to 5% of the first $100,000, and then lower percentages on the remaining amount of the estate.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 28, 2026
The state also has goals, including some that have been in place since 2012, that set declining limits on smog-causing pollutants and required automakers to sell increasing percentages of electric and hybrid vehicles through 2025.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 3, 2026
"We don't look at percentages, we don't actually believe that is the right metric," Deborah Jevans, the chair of the All England Club, told BBC Sport earlier this month.
From BBC ● Jun. 24, 2026
Elementary schools by and large do manage to teach the basic algorithms for multiplication and division, addition and subtraction, as well as methods for handling fractions, decimals, and percentages.
From "Innumeracy: Mathematical Illiteracy and Its Consequences" by John Allen Paulos
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.
