ten
1 Americannoun
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a cardinal number, nine plus one.
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a symbol for this number, as 10 or X.
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a set of this many persons or things.
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a playing card with ten pips.
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Informal. a ten-dollar bill.
She had two tens and a five in her purse.
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Also called ten's place. Mathematics.
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(in a mixed number) the position of the second digit to the left of the decimal point.
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(in a whole number) the position of the second digit from the right.
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adjective
idioms
abbreviation
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tenor.
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Music. tenuto.
noun
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the cardinal number that is the sum of nine and one. It is the base of the decimal number system and the base of the common logarithm See also number
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a numeral, 10, X, etc, representing this number
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something representing, represented by, or consisting of ten units, such as a playing card with ten symbols on it
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Also called: ten o'clock. ten hours after noon or midnight
determiner
combining form
Etymology
Origin of ten
before 900; Middle English ten ( e ), tenn ( e ), Old English tēn ( e ), tīen ( e ); cognate with Dutch tien, German zehn, Old Norse tīu, Gothic taihun, Latin decem, Greek déka, Sanskrit daśa
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.
He adds, "In the USA alone, tens of thousands of people die every year from antibiotic-resistant bacterial infections, and that number is rising rapidly. We need new antibiotics to combat this."
From Science Daily
The California city of San Francisco in December sued ten leading food makers over their ultra-processed products, accusing the industry's giants of knowingly selling foods that have been linked to a rise in serious diseases.
From BBC
With chips, the precision of that “image” is measured in tens of atoms.
In addition to delivering detailed views of DNA structure, Pico-C requires only very small samples -- about ten times less material than standard techniques.
From Science Daily
The council has been asked about the total cost of the project, which is understood to have run to tens of millions of pounds.
From BBC
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.
