term
Pluralterms
Pluralterms
- 1A word or phrase, especially one from a specialized field of knowledge, used as the name for a concept.
Engineers reach for a precise term when an everyday word would be too vague.
Linguists borrow many terms from Greek and Latin.
UsageA term for something: the Latin term for a body part. Often technical term, legal term.
Similarword, expression, designation
Note
A term need not be a single word. Red blood cell, RBC and erythrocyte are three terms for one concept: a phrase, an abbreviation and a word. That marks the useful line between term and word. A term is defined by the concept it names within a field, the way algorithm is in computer science, whatever shape it takes.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 1 fact
- Red blood cell, RBC and erythrocyte name the same concept. cancer.gov
- 2A limited or fixed period of time, especially one set as a limit, such as the period a policy, loan, or patent remains in force.
The insurance policy runs for a fixed term of ten years.
Negotiators agreed to extend the term of the trade agreement.
UsageCommon: for a term of ten years, a fixed term. Also in the short term and in the long term.
Note
Time entered the word early. In Medieval Latin, terminus already meant "a time, period" as well as a boundary. A term of time is a limit drawn around days instead of land, and it grew from the boundary sense. Lawyers use it most precisely: the term of a lease is the period during which the lease is in effect, and it may be fixed, periodic, or of indefinite length.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
- The time sense has medieval antecedents: Medieval Latin terminus meant a time or period as well as a boundary. en.wiktionary.org
- The time sense ultimately developed from the boundary sense. en.wiktionary.org
- 3The length of time a person holds an office, or the limit set on it.
The senator is serving her third term in office.
Several lawmakers want to limit each governor to two terms.
UsagePeople serve a term, win a second term, or reach a term limit; also term in office.
Note
The sense is tied to holding an office. A prisoner's term of six years, a debtor's term to pay, and the planning compounds near-term, mid-term and long-term draw instead on the general time-period sense. "Under his term," as Ehud Barak said of Netanyahu in 2023, places events inside someone's time in office.
- 4The conditions or requirements of a contract or agreement, including those that set the price and how and when payment must be made.
The contract included a term requiring both parties to keep the details private.
She objected to one term that allowed the company to cancel without notice.
UsageUsually plural: the terms of an agreement, terms and conditions. On my terms means on my conditions.
Similarcondition, provision, clause, stipulation
- 5One of the periods into which the year is divided, especially for teaching at a school or university or for the sitting of courts of law.
She struggled in math during the fall term.
The college splits its calendar into two long terms.
UsageOften this term, next term, the spring term, the end of term.
- 6The state of the relations or dealings between people.
The brothers remained on good terms despite the inheritance dispute.
Rival companies stayed on cordial terms throughout the negotiations.
UsagePlural, usually after on: on good terms with someone, on speaking terms. On my terms is about conditions instead.
- 7To name or describe something using a particular word or phrase.
Scientists term the process by which plants make food photosynthesis.
Historians have termed the era a golden age.
UsageThe name follows the object directly, with no as: they termed it a golden age. Often passive.
Similarcall, name, label, dub, designate
Note
It is often passive, as when Charles Sanders Peirce wrote in 1867 of modes that "may be termed discrimination and dissociation." It suits the moment a label is introduced or proposed, which is why it sits so close to a word for a concept.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
- The passage dates to Peirce's 1867 presentation; its first publication was in 1868. en.wikisource.org
- Peirce used the exact quoted words to describe modes of mental separation. cspeirce.com
- 8A number or expression forming a separate part of a sum or difference, joined to the others by a plus or minus sign.
Each term in the polynomial is separated by a plus or minus sign.
In the expression 3x + 5x + 2, the first two terms can be added to make 8x.
UsageTerms cancel out, combine or are collected; like terms share the same variables and powers.
Note
In 3x² + 2x − 5 there are three terms, and the last is −5 rather than 5, because each term carries the sign in front of it. Terms contrast with factors, which are multiplied together inside one term, so 3 and x² are factors of the term 3x².
Less common meanings
- 9The normal length of gestation for a species, or the point at which birth is expected.
Her pregnancy went to full term without complications.
Twins are often delivered before term.
UsageCommon phrases: go to full term, come to term, born at term or before term.
Note
Here the word does double duty. It names the whole span of gestation and, by metonymy, the moment that span ends. Preterm and postterm are built on that endpoint, and the medical adjective describes a birth that reaches that endpoint.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 1 fact
- The gestational endpoint sense of term is metonymic. en.wiktionary.org
- 10Born or delivered at the normal completion of pregnancy.
A term infant typically requires less monitoring than a premature one.
The newborn was term and breathing well on her own.
Oppositepremature
Note
Clinical shorthand that turns at term into an adjective: a term neonate, a term infant. It pairs naturally with preterm and postterm, which are built on the gestation sense.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
- Preterm is formed from pre- and term. en.wiktionary.org
- Preterm and postterm are connected to the gestational sense of term. jamanetwork.com
- 11In logic, the subject or predicate of a proposition, or one of the three parts of a syllogism, each used twice.
Every categorical proposition joins a subject term to a predicate term.
The middle term appears in both premises but not in the conclusion.
Note
Logic's use of the word goes back to Aristotle. As William Hamilton put it in his lectures published in 1860, the subject and predicate of a proposition are "together called its terms or extremes." Extremes is the telling synonym: the terms are the two ends a proposition joins, an echo of the boundary sense. In a syllogism, the middle term links the premises and drops out of the conclusion.
Checked 1 Nov 2026 · 5 facts
- The logical sense goes back to Aristotle. en.wikisource.org
- The logic lectures were first delivered in 1837–1838 and published posthumously in 1860. The larger collection was published in 1859–1860. en.wikipedia.org
- William Hamilton used the quoted wording about the subject and predicate. en.wiktionary.org
- The logical terminology echoes the boundary sense and represents the two ends joined by a proposition. en.wikipedia.org
- The middle term connects the premises and is absent from the conclusion. en.wikipedia.org
- 12To terminate something, especially to end someone's employment or to delete a user's account on a website or online service.
The company termed half its support staff after the merger fell through.
If sales stay this low, the regional office may term several managers.
UsageMostly workplace talk. When you mean dismissing an employee, fire is clearer in writing.
Similarterminate, fire, dismiss, sack
Oppositehire
- 13A woman's monthly menstrual period.
My wife, after the absence of her terms for seven weeks, gave me hopes of her being with child, but on the last day of the year she hath them again.
1660, Samuel Pepys, DiaryNote
An archaic sense, used in the plural. Samuel Pepys wrote in 1660 that after "the absence of her terms for seven weeks" he hoped his wife was pregnant, until she had "them again." The idea is a period that returns on schedule, the timespan sense applied to the body.
Checked 2 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
- The menstrual sense occurs in the plural. en.wiktionary.org
- Samuel Pepys wrote the quoted passage in 1660. en.wikipedia.org
- 14That which marks the limit of something; its boundary, end, or furthest point, including a point, line, or surface bounding a figure.
Corruption is a reciprocal to generation, and they two are as nature's two terms, or boundaries.
1627, Francis [Bacon], Sylua Syluarum - 15Any of certain fixed days of the year on which rent falls due.
- 16A person whose employment has been ended.
- 17A computer program that imitates the behavior of a physical terminal.
- 18A sculpture of the upper body, sometimes armless, that ends below in a tapering pillar or pedestal.
- 19An essential dignity in which unequal parts of each astrological sign have their own planetary rulerships, affecting the power and integrity of each planet in a natal chart.
- 20A piece of carved work fixed under each end of the taffrail, the rail across a ship's stern.
Showing meanings only.
Practice
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Origin
English term developed from Middle English terme, a borrowing of Old French terme. The French word descended from Latin terminus, meaning a boundary, limit or end. In Medieval Latin, terminus also meant a time, period or word. Its ancestry reaches back to Proto-Indo-European *térmn̥, meaning a stump, end or boundary. Old English also had termen, from the same Latin source.