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fifth

/fɪfθ/adjective, noun, verb

fifth is an adjective meaning “The ordinal form of the number five” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled F-I-F-T-H and has one syllable, and it appears 60 times per million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data).

What does fifth mean?

adjective

  1. 1

    The ordinal form of the number five.

noun

  1. 1

    The person or thing in the fifth position.

  2. 2

    The fifth gear of a transmission.

  3. 3

    One of five equal parts of a whole: one-fifth.

  4. 4

    USA quantity of liquor equal to one-fifth of an American gallon, or, more commonly, 750 milliliters (that is, three quarters of a liter).

  5. 5

    The musical interval between one note and another five scale degrees higher (the fifth note in a scale)

  6. 6

    The fifth voice in a polyphonic melody.

verb

  1. 1

    To sing in the fifth voice in a polyphonic melody.

  2. 2

    informalTo support something fifth, after four others have already done so.

  3. 3

    nonstandardTo divide by five.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How do you pronounce fifth?

  • US /fɪfθ/
  • US /fɪθ/
  • US /fɪft/

Fifth has one syllable (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-us-fifth.ogg, En-US_fifth_(informal).ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Forms of fifth

  • fifths plural, present, singular, he/she/it
  • fifthing participle, present
  • fifthed participle, past

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How common is fifth?

Fifth appears 60 times per million words in written English, the 1,724th most frequent word form in the list.

Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).

How do you abbreviate fifth?

Wiktionary records one abbreviation of fifth: Vth.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

Fifth in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Frenchcinquième, cinq (Ordinal form of the number 5 – see also 5th), quinte (musical interval)
Germanfünfte (Ordinal form of the number 5 – see also 5th), Quinte (musical interval), Fünfte (person or thing in the fifth position), Fünftel (one of five equal parts of a whole)
Portuguesequinto (Ordinal form of the number 5 – see also 5th), quinta (person or thing in the fifth position)
Spanishquinto (Ordinal form of the number 5 – see also 5th)

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.

Where does fifth come from?

From Middle English fifthe, fifte, fift, from Old English fīfta (“fifth”), from Proto-Germanic *fimftô (“fifth”) or *femftô, equivalent to five + -th (ordinal suffix). Cognate with Scots fift, fyft (“fifth”), North Frisian fyfde (“fifth”), West Frisian fyfde (“fifth”), Dutch vijfde (“fifth”), Low German fifte, föfte, füfte (“fifth”), German fünfte (“fifth”), Danish femte (“fifth”), Swedish femte (“fifth”), Icelandic fimmta (“fifth”).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).