performance
Pluralperformances
- 1How well a person, team, machine, or organization does a job or activity, judged by its results or efficiency.
Like a report card showing how well a machine does its job.
The engine's performance dropped sharply at high altitude.
Analysts praised the software for its performance under heavy load.
UsageOften with no article: performance dropped, better performance. Use the plural for separate efforts or results: the team's recent performances.
Similarefficiency, functioning, operation
- 2A presentation of a play, concert, dance, or other entertainment before an audience, usually live.
The orchestra's evening performance featured three new compositions.
Tickets for tonight's performance sold out within hours.
UsageA company gives or puts on a performance; the audience attends or sits through it.
Similarshow, concert, recital, production
- 3The carrying out of an action, task, or duty, or something done or accomplished, especially something notable.
The smooth performance of the ceremony required weeks of rehearsal.
Faithful performance of the contract is required of both parties by law.
UsageUsually the performance of + a duty or task: the performance of his duties.
Similarexecution, fulfillment, discharge, conduct, completion
Note
The root sense, and the one the word's shape spells out: Middle English parfourmaunce, simply perform plus -ance. In Georgette Heyer's The Unknown Ajax (1959), Charles makes no noise in the performance of his duties. Said of a team or an engine, it shifts from the bare doing toward a judgment of how well something was done.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 3 facts
- Performance derives from Middle English parfourmaunce and is equivalent to perform plus -ance. en.wiktionary.org
- Georgette Heyer wrote The Unknown Ajax, first published in 1959. static.fnac-static.com
- The novel describes Charles avoiding noise in the performance of his duties; this is narration about Charles. en.wikipedia.org
Less common meanings
- 4A job or procedure that takes far more fuss, trouble, or effort than it ought to.
Getting the council to approve a garden shed turned into a right performance.
Mum makes such a performance of packing for a weekend away that we never leave on time.
UsageUsually a complaint: what a performance!, such a performance, make a performance of something.
Similarfuss, palaver, production, rigmarole
Note
Nobody is on stage, which is worth knowing, because a listener outside Britain may first hear a live show where only a fuss is meant.
- 5The manner in which an actor brings a role to life, or a singer or musician interprets a piece, on stage, on screen, or on a recording.
Critics singled out his performance as a grieving father as the best thing in the film.
The pianist's performance of the sonata on the new album is slower and more delicate than her earlier recording.
UsageActors give, deliver or turn in a performance, often as a role: her performance as the queen.
Similarportrayal, interpretation, rendition
Note
Here the word sizes up one person's work rather than naming the event, which is the live show. A single show can hold a dozen performances in this sense, one for each actor, and a film made with no audience present still has them.
- 6The actual use of language by speakers in concrete situations, distinct from the underlying knowledge of the language they possess (competence).
Practice
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Origin
This word comes from Middle English "parfourmaunce," and is equivalent to "perform" plus the suffix "-ance."
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
- Performance comes from Middle English parfourmaunce. en.wiktionary.org
- Performance is equivalent to perform plus the suffix -ance. en.wiktionary.org