- 3
- There are only three cookies left.
- three of Sweden’s top financial experts
- Ten people were invited but only three turned up.
- Can you lend me three dollars?
- a three-month contract
- Look at page three.
- Three and four is seven.
- Three threes are nine.
- I can't read your writing—is this meant to be a three?
- The bulbs are planted in threes or fives (= groups of three or five).
- We moved to America when I was three (= three years old).
- Shall we meet at three (= at three o'clock), then?
Word OriginOld English thrīe (masculine), thrīo, thrēo (feminine), of Germanic origin; related to Dutch drie and German drei, from an Indo-European root shared by Latin tres and Greek treis.
Idioms
See three in the Oxford Advanced American DictionarySee three in the Oxford Learner's Dictionary of Academic Englishin twos and threes
- two or three at a time; in small numbers
- People arrived in twos and threes.
the three Rs
- (old-fashioned) reading, writing and arithmetic, thought to be the most important parts of a child’s education
Check pronunciation:
three