percentile
/pɚˈsɛn.taɪl/noun
percentile is spelled P-E-R-C-E-N-T-I-L-E: 10 letters and 3 syllables. It appears 1.2 times per million words in written English, the 25,751st most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, percentile means “Any of the ninety-nine points that divide an ordered distribution into one hundred parts, each containing one per cent of the population” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of percentile is percentiles.
How many letters and syllables are in percentile?
| Letters | 10: P-E-R-C-E-N-T-I-L-E |
|---|---|
| Syllables | 3 (from its American pronunciation) |
| In writing | 1.2 times per million words; the 25,751st most frequent word form |
| Wrong spellings searched | none measured in search |
Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How common is percentile?
Percentile appears 1.2 times per million words in written English, the 25,751st 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 pronounce percentile?
- /pəɹˈsɛn.taɪl/
- US /pɚˈsɛn.taɪl/
- UK /pəˈsɛn.taɪl/
Percentile has 3 syllables (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: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Rho9998-percentile.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of percentile
- percentiles plural
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
What does percentile mean?
The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).
noun
- 1
Any of the ninety-nine points that divide an ordered distribution into one hundred parts, each containing one per cent of the population.
- 2
Any one of the hundred groups so divided.
She is highly intelligent–she has an IQ in the top percentile.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you abbreviate percentile?
Wiktionary records 2 abbreviations of percentile: centile, pctl..
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
Percentile in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense any of the ninety-nine points:
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 percentile come from?
Coined by Francis Galton in 1885, from percent + -ile.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).