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.

Orbit vs Cycle - What's the difference?

orbit | cycle |

As nouns the difference between orbit and cycle

is that orbit is orbit (path of one object around another object) while cycle is an interval of space or time in which one set of events or phenomena is completed.

As a verb cycle is

to ride a bicycle or other.

orbit

English

Noun

(en noun)
  • A circular or elliptical path of one object around another object.
    • The Moon's orbit around the Earth takes nearly one month to complete.
  • A sphere of influence; an area of control.
    • In the post WWII era, several eastern European countries came into the orbit of the Soviet Union.
  • The course of one's usual progression, or the extent of one's typical range.
    • The convenience store was a heavily travelled point in her daily orbit , as she purchased both cigarettes and lottery tickets there.
  • (anatomy) The bony cavity containing the eyeball; the eye socket.
  • (physics) The path an electron takes around an atom's nucleus.
  • (mathematics) A collection of points related by the evolution function of a dynamical system.

    • Derived terms

    * *

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To circle or revolve around another object.
    • The Earth orbits the Sun.
  • To move around the general vicinity of something.
    • The harried mother had a cloud of children orbiting her, asking for sweets.
  • To place an object into an orbit around a planet.
    • A rocket was used to orbit the satellite.

    Synonyms

    * (move around the general vicinity of) circumambulate, tag along * (place an object into an orbit) launch

    Derived terms

    * orbital

    See also

    * satellite * (wikipedia "orbit")

    cycle

    English

    (wikipedia cycle)

    Noun

    (en noun)
  • An interval of space or time in which one set of events or phenomena is completed.
    • the cycle of the seasons, or of the year
  • * Burke
    • Wages to the medium of provision during the last bad cycle of twenty years.
  • A complete rotation of anything.
  • A process that returns to its beginning and then repeats itself in the same sequence.
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-08-10, volume=408, issue=8848, magazine=(The Economist)
    • , title= Legal highs: 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.}}
  • The members of the sequence formed by such a process.
  • (music) In musical set theory, an interval cycle is the set of pitch classes resulting from repeatedly applying the same interval class to the starting pitch class.
  • A series of poems, songs or other works of art.
  • A programme on a washing machine, dishwasher, or other such device.
    • the spin cycle
  • A pedal-powered vehicle, such as a unicycle, bicycle, or tricycle; or, motorized vehicle that has either two or three wheels, such as a motorbike, motorcycle, motorized tricycle, or motortrike.
  • (baseball) A single, a double, a triple, and a home run hit by the same player in the same game.
  • (graph theory) A closed walk or path, with or without repeated vertices allowed.
  • An imaginary circle or orbit in the heavens; one of the celestial spheres.
    • (Milton)
    (Burke)
  • An age; a long period of time.
  • * Tennyson
    • Better fifty years of Europe than a cycle of Cathay.
  • An orderly list for a given time; a calendar.
  • * Evelyn
    • We present our gardeners with a complete cycle of what is requisite to be done throughout every month of the year.
  • (botany) One entire round in a circle or a spire.
    • a cycle or set of leaves
    (Gray)

    Usage notes

    * (aviation sense) One take-off and landing of an aircraft is a (term), referring to a (term) which places stresses on the fuselage. * (baseball sense) As in the example sentence, one is usually said to (term). However, other uses also occur, such as (term) and (term).

    Derived terms

    * cycle path * cyclic * acyclic

    Verb

    (cycl)
  • To ride a bicycle or other .
  • To go through a cycle or to put through a cycle.
  • (electronics) To turn power off and back on
    • Avoid cycling the device unnecessarily.
  • (ice hockey) To maintain a team's possession of the puck in the offensive zone by handling and passing the puck in a loop from the boards near the goal up the side boards and passing to back to the boards near the goal
    • They have their cycling game going tonight.

    Related terms

    * recycle

    Anagrams

    * ----