Meaning & use
thousands
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“thousands” is a form of “thousand”. See that entry for the full set of meanings.
Meanings
nounplural
A very large number of people or things, in the range of several thousand or more.
Grammar: Plural noun followed by of: thousands of people are waiting, not thousands people.
Patterns
- thousands of something
- in the thousands
Thousands of fans filled the stadium.
Thousands of birds pass over this valley each autumn.
Repairs cost thousands of dollars.
nounpluralmathematics
The digit position in a number that counts groups of one thousand.
Grammar: Used in math: the thousands column in 4,500 shows the digit 4.
Patterns
- the thousands place
- the thousands column
In 7,215 the digit in the thousands place is 7.
Round the number to the nearest thousands.
Add the thousands first, then the hundreds.
Common combinations
- thousands of people
- Thousands of people marched through the capital.
- tens of thousands
- Tens of thousands of visitors come every summer.
- thousands of dollars
- Fixing the roof will cost thousands of dollars.
- in the thousands
- Losses were in the thousands by the end of the week.
- thousands upon thousands
- Thousands upon thousands of leaves covered the park.
Synonyms and how they differ
- masses
- Masses is informal and vaguer, suggesting a huge crowd or amount, while thousands points to a number above a thousand.
- multitudes
- Multitudes is literary and stresses a vast crowd of people, and it sounds dramatic next to thousands.
- countless
- Countless is an adjective meaning too many to count, so it does not take of the way thousands of does.
- scores
- Scores means groups of about twenty, so it suggests a far smaller quantity than thousands.
Opposites
Word family
- thousand number
- the number 1,000
- thousandth adjective
- coming at position one thousand
- thousandfold adverb
- a thousand times as much
- millennium noun
- a period of a thousand years
Commonly confused: thousands or thousand?
thousands vs thousand
After a specific number, thousand stays singular: five thousand people. Thousands is used only with of when no exact number is given.
Practice
Which sentence is correct?
Choose one answer.
Thousands needs of before a noun when no exact number is given. Five thousand would be correct without s, but five thousands is not.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “thousands”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.