Meaning of year in English

year

noun

/jɪər/ us

/jɪr/

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A1 [ C ]

a period of twelve months, especially from 1 January to 31 December:

Annette worked in Italy for two years.

2005 was one of the worst years of my life.

We went to Egypt on holiday last year.

At this time of year the beaches are almost deserted.

This species keeps its leaves all year (round) (= through the year).

[ C ]

a period of twelve months relating to a particular activity:

The financial/tax year begins in April.

A2 [ C ]

the part of the year, in a school or university, during which courses are taught:

the academic/school year

UK She's now in her final/first/second year at Manchester University.

US My daughter is in her freshman/sophomore/junior/senior year.

[ C, + sing/pl verb ] UK

(US class)

a group of students who start school, college, university, or a course together:

Kathy was in the year above me at college.

More examplesFewer examples

We look forward to greater success in the coming year.
I'm still in contact with her - we write a couple of times a year.
I'm contemplating going abroad for a year.
We have put some money on one side for next year's summer holiday.
He served four years in prison for robbery.

SMART Vocabulary: related words and phrases

Specific periods of time

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You can also find related words, phrases, and synonyms in the topics:

Years & yearly

Schools in general

Students & pupils

Idioms

for a man/woman/person of his/her years
for years
from/since the year dot
in/through all the years
of the year
put years on someone
take years off someone
year in, year out

-year

suffix

/ -jɪər/ us

/ -jɪr/

used to refer to a student in a particular year group at a school, college, or university:

I like teaching the first-years, but the second-years can be difficult.

a first-year student

SMART Vocabulary: related words and phrases

Students & pupils

See more results »

(Definition of year from the Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary & Thesaurus © Cambridge University Press)

year | American Dictionary

year

noun [ C ]

/jɪər/

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any period of twelve months, or a particular period of twelve months beginning with January 1:

last/next year

She brought along her eight-year-old daughter.

My parents have been married for 30 years.

Richard earned his degree in the year 1995.

You can get cheaper fares now, so it’s a good time of year to travel abroad.

In a school, a year refers to the part of the year during which courses are taught:

September is the start of the new academic year.

Idioms

in years

year in and year out

(Definition of year from the Cambridge Academic Content Dictionary © Cambridge University Press)

year | Business English

year

noun [ C ]

/jɪər/ us

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(also calendar year)

a period of 365 or 366 days, starting on January 1st and ending on December 31st:

The project took five years to complete.

last/next/this year

the following/previous year

a period of twelve months relating to a particular activity:

He earns $68,000 a year.

years

a long time:

It's taken years to get funding for the project.

He's been doing the same job for years.

of the year

a thing or person of the year is one that has been chosen as the best in a particular area or activity for that year:

She won the Business Woman of the Year award in 2010.

year after year

every year for a long period:

The fund produces terrific results year after year.

year by year

if something increases, develops, etc. year by year, it happens each year over a period of time:

Savers should monitor their funds year by year.

Credit card fraud is still increasing on a year-by-year basis.

year in, year out

if something happens year in, year out, it has been happening for a while and is expected to continue in the same way:

Investors should choose a fund that does consistently well year in, year out.

Examples of year

year

All age groups were affected and the median age was 39 years (range 1-89 years) ; 52 % were men.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The mean age of the 45 patients was 29.0 years (range 1-77 years).

From the Cambridge English Corpus

All age groups (nine children, five adults) were affected (mean 24 years, range 1.5-75 years).

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Over the next sixteen years, only 83 men appear, from no more than 56 families.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The level of effective coverage at 2 years is shown on the x-axis.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The mean age of patients was 68.6 years (median .0 years, range 0-101 years) and 53 % (2490/4718) 75 were aged >50 years.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Median age was 38 years (range 0- 96 years).

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The response among young male adults aged 20 -24 years was particularly poor (y20 %).

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The median age was 31 years (interquartile range 27-34 years).

From the Cambridge English Corpus

During these years no mass immunization against influenza was conducted in these communities.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Clitics understandably come in for fuller treatment (394-410) given the extensive attention they have attracted in recent years.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

During a period of over 20 years, the field, which this journal has set out to address, has experienced enormous progress.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

From 12,000 employees in 1991 it mushroomed to 19,000 five years later.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

In the early years of this decade the approach known as ' generative semantics ' had become predominant.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Still, it is interesting to note that the link between local elections in 2004 and presidential elections two years later is tenuous at best.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

See all examples of year

These examples are from corpora and from sources on the web. Any opinions in the examples do not represent the opinion of the Cambridge Dictionary editors or of Cambridge University Press or its licensors.

What is the pronunciation of year, -year?