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difference.

The quality of being different.

10 characters3 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈdɪf.(ə.)ɹəns/Received-Pronunciation/ˈdɪf.(ə.)ɹəns/General-American/ˈdɪf.(ə.)ɹəns/Australia/ˈdəf.(ə.)ɹəns/New-Zealand
  1. The quality of being different.

    uncountable
    You need to learn to be more tolerant of difference.
  2. A characteristic of something that makes it different from something else.

    countable
    There are three differences between these two pictures.
  3. A disagreement or argument.

    countable
    We have our little differences, but we are firm friends.
  4. Significant change in or effect on a situation or state.

    countable · uncountable
    It just won't make much difference to me.
    It just won't make much of a difference to anyone.
  5. The result of a subtraction; sometimes the absolute value of this result.

    countable
    The difference between 3 and 21 is 18.
  6. Choice; preference.

    countable · obsolete · uncountable
  7. An addition to a coat of arms to distinguish two people's bearings which would otherwise be the same. See augmentation and cadency.

    countable · uncountable
  8. The quality or attribute which is added to those of the genus to constitute a species; a differentia.

    countable · uncountable
  9. A Boolean operation which is true when the two input variables are different but is otherwise false; the XOR operation ( scriptstyle A◌̅B+◌̅AB).

    countable · uncountable
  10. The set of elements that are in one set but not another ( scriptstyle A◌̅B).

    countable · relational · uncountable
Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *dwóh₁ ▲ Proto-Indo-European *trísinflu. Proto-Indo-European *d(w)is- Proto-Italic *dis- Latin dis- Proto-Indo-European *bʰer- Proto-Indo-European *-eti Proto-Indo-European *bʰéreti Proto-Italic *ferō Latin ferō Latin differō Latin differēns Proto-Indo-European *-(i)yós Proto-Italic *-ijos Proto-Italic *-ios Old Latin -ios Latin -ius Latin -ia Latin differentiader. Old French differencebor. Middle English difference English difference From Middle English difference, from Old French difference, from Latin differentia (“difference”), from differēns (“different”), present participle of differre. Doublet of differentia. Morphologically differ + -ence.

verb/ˈdɪf.(ə.)ɹəns/Received-Pronunciation/ˈdɪf.(ə.)ɹəns/General-American/ˈdɪf.(ə.)ɹəns/Australia/ˈdəf.(ə.)ɹəns/New-Zealand
  1. To distinguish or differentiate.

    obsolete · transitive
  2. to modify a heraldic emblem so as to distinguish one branch of a house from another

Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *dwóh₁ ▲ Proto-Indo-European *trísinflu. Proto-Indo-European *d(w)is- Proto-Italic *dis- Latin dis- Proto-Indo-European *bʰer- Proto-Indo-European *-eti Proto-Indo-European *bʰéreti Proto-Italic *ferō Latin ferō Latin differō Latin differēns Proto-Indo-European *-(i)yós Proto-Italic *-ijos Proto-Italic *-ios Old Latin -ios Latin -ius Latin -ia Latin differentiader. Old French differencebor. Middle English difference English difference From Middle English difference, from Old French difference, from Latin differentia (“difference”), from differēns (“different”), present participle of differre. Doublet of differentia. Morphologically differ + -ence.

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.