Meaning & use
exponential
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Meanings
adjectivecomparablemathematicstechnical
Growing or shrinking by a fixed percentage over each equal period, so the change becomes steadily larger or smaller in absolute terms.
Grammar: Usually comes before a noun: exponential growth; it can also follow a verb: the spread was exponential.
Patterns
- exponential growth
- exponential decay
- an exponential increase in something
The bacteria showed exponential growth, doubling in number every twenty minutes.
Radioactive material undergoes exponential decay, losing half its strength in each fixed interval.
The graph curves upward because the population rise is exponential, not steady.
adjectivecomparableinformal
Extremely rapid and getting faster, used loosely for any very large or accelerating increase.
Grammar: Often modifies growth, increase or rise; careful writers keep it for real acceleration, not just big numbers.
Patterns
- an exponential rise in something
- grow at an exponential rate
Online orders have seen an exponential rise since the shop launched its app.
The team faced exponential pressure as each deadline arrived sooner than the last.
Her confidence grew at an exponential rate once she joined the choir.
Word forms
| adverb | exponentially |
|---|
Common combinations
- exponential growth
- Exponential growth in users forced the company to buy more servers.
- exponential curve
- The sales chart traced an exponential curve over three years.
- exponential decay
- The drug's concentration in the blood follows exponential decay.
- an exponential rate
- Rumors spread at an exponential rate through the small town.
- exponential function
- Students plotted an exponential function to model compound interest.
Synonyms and how they differ
- rapid
- Rapid only says something is fast, whereas exponential says the speed itself keeps increasing.
- geometric
- Geometric, as in geometric progression, is the discrete-step cousin of exponential and is used mostly in mathematics.
- runaway
- Runaway stresses that growth is out of control, while exponential describes the mathematical pattern whether or not it is a problem.
Opposites
Word family
- exponentially adverb
- in a way that increases or decreases by repeated multiplication, or very quickly
- exponent noun
- a small raised number showing how many times to multiply a number by itself
- exponentiation noun
- the mathematical operation of raising a number to a power
Commonly confused: exponential or logarithmic?
exponential vs logarithmic
A logarithmic pattern rises quickly then flattens, which is the mirror image of exponential growth that keeps speeding up.
Practice
Which situation is the best example of exponential growth?
Choose one answer.
Doubling each period means the increase itself keeps getting larger, which is exponential; the other options add a fixed amount, which is linear.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “exponential”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.