What's the difference between
and
Enter two words to compare and contrast their definitions, origins, and synonyms to better understand how those words are related.

Multiple vs Few - What's the difference?

multiple | few |

As an adjective multiple

is multiple.

As a proper noun few is

(british) the pilots who fought in the battle of britain.

multiple

English

(wikipedia multiple)

Adjective

(en adjective)
  • Having more than one element, part, component, or function, particularly many.
  • * {{quote-magazine, year=2013, month=July-August, author= Catherine Clabby
    • , magazine=(American Scientist), title= Focus on Everything , passage=Not long ago, it was difficult to produce photographs of tiny creatures with every part in focus.

    Synonyms

    * (l) * (l) * (l) * (l) * (l)

    Antonyms

    * (many) (l) (rare)

    Derived terms

    * Law of multiple proportion (Law of Dalton) * multiple algebra * multiple conjugation * multiple exposure * multiple fruits * multiple orgasm * multiple star

    Related terms

    * multi- * multiplier * multiplicity * multiply

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • (mathematics) A number that may be divided by another number with no remainder.
  • * 14, 21 and 70 are multiples of 7
  • (finance) Price-earnings ratio.
  • One of a set of the same thing; a duplicate.
  • A single individual who has multiple personalities.
  • * 2010 , Ann M. Garvey, Ann's Multiple World of Personality: Regular No Cream, No Sugar
    • I had seen its first show when it was a freebie, but I thought it made multiples in general look silly – no one changes clothes THAT much!
  • * 2000 , Henk Driessen, ?Ton Otto, Perplexities of identification (page 115)
    • Non-abused multiples have no need of doctors, and they have carved out a foothold of their own from where they speak confidently about their utopian vision of a multiple world.

    Derived terms

    * common multiple * least common multiple

    few

    English

    Determiner

  • (preceded by another determiner) An indefinite, but usually small, number of.
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-08-10, volume=408, issue=8848, magazine=(The Economist)
    • , title= A new prescription , passage=No sooner has a [synthetic] drug been blacklisted than chemists adjust their recipe and start churning out a subtly different one. These “legal highs” are sold for the few months it takes the authorities to identify and ban them, and then the cycle begins again.}}
    I was expecting lots of people at the party, but very few''''' (=''almost none'') ''turned up.   Quite a '''few''' of them'' (=''many of them'') ''were pleasantly surprised.   I don't know how many drinks I've had, but I've had a '''few . [This usage is likely ironic.]
  • (used alone) Not many; a small (in comparison with another number stated or implied) but somewhat indefinite number of.
  • (meteorology, of clouds) (US?) Obscuring one eighth to two eighths of the sky.
    • NOAA definition of the term "few clouds": An official sky cover classification for aviation weather observations, descriptive of a sky cover of 1/8 to 2/8. This is applied only when obscuring phenomenon aloft are present--that is, not when obscuring phenomenon are surface-based, such as fog.
  • (meteorology, of rainfall with regard to a location) (US?) Having a 10 percent chance of measurable precipitation (0.01 inch); used interchangeably with isolated.

    • Usage notes

    * (term) is used with plural nouns only; its synonymous counterpart (little) is used with nouns. * Although indefinite in nature, a few is usually more than two (two often being referred to as "a couple of"), and less than "several". If the sample population is say between 5 and 20, a few would mean three or four, but no more than this. However, if the population sample size were in the millions, "a few" could refer to several hundred items. In other words, few'' in this context means ''a very very small percentage but way over the 3 or 4 usually ascribed to it its use with much much smaller numbers. : (term) is grammatically affirmative but semantically negative, and it can license negative polarity items. For example, lift a finger usually cannot be used in affirmative sentences, but can be used in sentences with (term). *: He didn't lift a finger to help us. *: *He lifted a finger to help us. (ungrammatical) *: Few people lifted a finger to help us. *: *A few people lifted a finger to help us. (ungrammatical) *: *Fewer people lifted a finger to help us. (ungrammatical)

    Synonyms

    * little (see usage)

    Antonyms

    * many

    Derived terms

    * a few * quite a few

    Related terms

    * paucity * poor

    Pronoun

    (English Pronouns)
  • Few people, few things.
    • Many are called, but few are chosen.

    Antonyms

    * many

    References

    * Meteorology (both senses) *: NOAA Glossary: f

    Statistics

    * 200 English basic words English indefinite pronouns 1000 English basic words