masses

British  

/ ˈmæsɪz /

plural noun

1. the body of common people

2. informal (often foll by of) great numbers or quantities

   masses of food

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Explanation

The masses refers to a large, general group of regular folks — the common people of a society. If you’re super rich, you ride around in a private jet while the masses take crowded buses. The masses don’t include celebrities, rich people, royalty, or political leaders. The masses are everybody else. People use this term when they need to speak generally about the majority, although it often refers to the lower class. To win an election, a politician must appeal to the masses. Popular movies and music also must appeal to the masses — in other words, they need mass appeal. The word masses is also just plural for any kind of mass.

Example Sentences

To determine whether the material itself could influence the measurement, they repeated the study using both copper and sapphire masses.

From Science Daily • May 18, 2026

He had also brought his bike, which seemed to be the best way to elude the masses.

From Los Angeles Times • May 18, 2026

The results were nearly identical, suggesting that the composition of the masses was not responsible for the discrepancy.

From Science Daily • May 18, 2026

The AI giant rattled users of secondary-share platforms, which bring investing in hot private companies to the masses.

From The Wall Street Journal • May 15, 2026

So from this one experiment we learned the masses of the Earth, the Sun, the Moon, the other planets and their moons, and got contour lines into the bargain–not bad for a summer’s work.

From "A Short History of Nearly Everything" by Bill Bryson