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odds

UK/ɒdz/US/ɑdz/
nounB22 meaningsVery common — you will meet it every day · #1,582 of 15,258neutral

The odds are the likelihood of something happening. The odds are against it, what are the odds, beat the odds.

It is always plural in this sense. In betting, odds have a precise form — five to one, evens — and they express the payout as much as the probability. Two idioms are very common: against all odds, meaning despite everything, and odds and ends, meaning small leftover items, which is a completely separate use. Note at odds with, meaning in disagreement or conflict with, which is formal and appears constantly in reporting.

Definitions of odds

  1. 1nounoddsThe likelihood of something happening.B2

    “The odds of that happening twice are remarkable.”

  2. 2nounratioThe ratio a bookmaker pays on a bet.B2

    “The odds shortened the week before the race.”

Too few real examples of this word to estimate which sense is commonest.

odds is a measure of likelihood.

Phrases it lives in

  • against all odds — despite everything making it unlikely
  • at odds with — in disagreement or conflict with

Where it comes from

Odds come from odd, meaning uneven. The odds on a bet are a measure of how far the two sides fail to match.

Built from

  • odd · English — uneven, strange

From odd (“uneven, strange”).

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in A Song of Ice and Fire

Practise this word

odds in the wild

  • In fixed-odds betting, the odds are fixed and determined at the time of placing the bet.

    Fixed-odds betting

  • Moneyline odds are used in the United States.

    Fixed-odds betting

  • A bookmaker, bookie or turf accountant is an organization or a person that accepts and pays out bets on sporting and other events at agreed-upon odds.

    Bookmaker

  • When Moneyline odds are quoted as a positive number +X, it means that a wager pays X to 100.

    Odds

  • When probability is expressed as a number between 0 and 1, the relationships between probability p and odds are as follows.

    Odds

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From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.