Other forms: peoples
People is the ordinary plural of person: more than one human being. Three people waiting at the bus stop, the people in the queue behind you, too many people in one small lift.
People takes a plural verb — people are, people were, people think — and getting that wrong is the commonest slip with this word. Persons exists, but it lives in police notices and legal documents; in normal English, say people. With "a" in front, a people is a whole nation or ethnic group with its own language and history, and you can speak of the peoples of the Pacific. "My people" can mean your family, your staff, or your kind. As a verb it is formal and belongs in books: to people a valley is to fill it with inhabitants.
1nounpeopleHuman beings; more than one person.~59%
“Thousands of people turned up for the free concert.”
2nounnationA nation or ethnic group with a shared culture, language and history (plural: peoples).~37%
“The exhibition covers the peoples who lived along the river.”
3nounfamilyThe family, staff or group that someone belongs to (informal).~2%
“I will have my people call your people.”
4verbfillTo fill a place with inhabitants (formal).~2%
“The islands were peopled by settlers from the mainland.”
Shares are an estimate: a language model read 13 sentences found in the wild and placed 13 of them on a sense — a count of our sample, not a measurement of English.
people is human beings.
People came in through French from Latin populus, and behind that stands Proto-Italic *poplos, which meant "army" — a people was once the men you could muster. It pushed out the native English word lede and took over half the ground that folk used to hold. For centuries it took a singular verb, which is why the King James Bible has "the people is hungry".
Proto-Italic
*poplos — army
itc-ola
populus
Middle English
puple
English, today
people
From Middle English puple, peple, peeple, from people, from pueple, peuple, pople, from populus, from itc-ola populus, from earlier poplus, from even earlier poplos, from Proto-Italic poplos (“army”) of unknown origin. a doublet of pueblo. Gradually ousted native English lede and, partially, folk. Originally used with singular verbs (e.g. "the people is hungry, and weary, and thirsty, in the wilderness" in the King James Version of 2 Samuel 17:29), the plural aspect of people is probably due to influence from Middle English lede, leed, a plural since Old English times; see lēode.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA