potentiometer
/pəˌtɛn(t)ʃiˈɑmɪtəɹ/noun
potentiometer is a noun meaning “A user-adjustable three-terminal variable resistor that can be used as a voltage divider” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled P-O-T-E-N-T-I-O-M-E-T-E-R, and it appears about once in every 7 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data). The plural of potentiometer is potentiometers.
What does potentiometer mean?
noun
- 1
A user-adjustable three-terminal variable resistor that can be used as a voltage divider.
- 2
An instrument that measures a voltage by opposing it with a precise fraction of a known voltage, and without drawing current from the unknown source.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you pronounce potentiometer?
- UK /pəˌtɛn(t)ʃiˈɒmɪtə/
- US /pəˌtɛn(t)ʃiˈɑmɪtəɹ/
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-potentiometer.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of potentiometer
- potentiometers plural
- potentiometre
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How common is potentiometer?
Potentiometer appears about once in every 7 million words in written English, the 80,453rd 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).
Potentiometer in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense user-adjustable variable resistor:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| French | potentiomètre |
| German | Potentiometer |
| Portuguese | potenciômetro |
| Spanish | potenciómetro |
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.