people
noun
peo·ple
| \ ˈpē-pəl
\
\
plural people
Definition of people
(Entry 1 of 2)
1
plural
: human beings making up a group or assembly or linked by a common interest
2
plural
: human beings, persons
—often used in compounds instead of persons salespeople —often used attributively people skills
3
plural
: the members of a family or kinship
4
plural
: the mass of a community as distinguished from a special class
disputes between the people and the nobles
—often used by Communists to distinguish Communists from other people
5
plural peoples
: a body of persons that are united by a common culture, tradition, or sense of kinship, that typically have common language, institutions, and beliefs, and that often constitute a politically organized group
6
: lower animals usually of a specified kind or situation
7
: the body of enfranchised citizens of a state
people
verb
peopled;
peopling\ ˈpē-p(ə-)liŋ
\
\
Definition of people (Entry 2 of 2)
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Other Words from people
Noun
peopleless
\ ˈpē-pə(l)-ləs
\
adjective
\
adjective
Examples of people in a Sentence
Noun
People can be really cruel sometimes. People think the coach should be fired. She tends to annoy people. People say it's impossible, but I'm still going to try. a book for young people a people who migrated across the Bering Strait the native peoples of MexicoVerb
a science-fiction novel about a mission to people Mars
Recent Examples on the Web: Noun
This past spring, an outbreak of E. coli traced to romaine lettuce made more than 200 people sick and killed five. — Maggie Fox /, NBC News, "61 sick in parasite outbreak linked to McDonald's salads," 14 July 2018 The Department of Homeland Security has reassigned an additional 230 people in order to comply with the court’s ruling, according to Azar, as reported by USA Today. — Sarah Kinosian, Teen Vogue, "Reunification Proves Complicated for Families Separated at the U.S.-Mexico Border," 14 July 2018 The other is that those innovative companies must be led by people intimately familiar with what is happening on the frontlines of care: doctors, nurses, and others who directly care for patients. — Alexi Nazem, STAT, "Health care needs more physician CEOs like Atul Gawande," 13 July 2018 The largest site will be at the Sacramento Community Center Theater, where 2,400 people are expected to participate. — Anthony Barcellos, sacbee, "How Big Sing California aims to bring joy to six cities and 10,000 performers," 13 July 2018 Like the Park, the concerts are free—a gift to the city’s people. — The New Yorker, "In Central Park, Naumburg Orchestral Concerts Are a Gift to the City," 13 July 2018 Price represented a comfortable suburban Atlanta district during his years in Congress, but people there don’t usually drive around throwing dollar bills out the window. — Ed Kilgore, Daily Intelligencer, "Auditor: Tom Price Owes Government $341,000 for Unauthorized Travel Expenses," 13 July 2018 Trans people and allies condemned the casting announcement across social media. — Josephine Livingstone, The New Republic, "Scarlett Johansson won’t play a trans man after all.," 13 July 2018 Of course, some people love to eat sushi every day, but that’s really not recommended for anyone because of the high mercury levels, Dr. Ruiz says. — Korin Miller, SELF, "Hilary Duff May Have Eaten Sushi While Pregnant and Everyone Needs to Chill Out About It," 13 July 2018Recent Examples on the Web: Verb
Farming support groups are not normally peopled with killers. — The Economist, "Killings in Congo’s north-east spark fears of a return to war," 13 July 2019 The place was bustling Thursday afternoon as peopled browsed through guitars, drums, keyboards and more. — Annie Zak, Anchorage Daily News, "Open & Shut: A new Wild Scoops location, a gelato spot and a Popeye’s comeback," 20 June 2019 In May 1999, 13 peopled died in Lake Hamilton near Hot Springs, Ark., when a duck boat took on water and sank suddenly. — Joe Barrett, WSJ, "Federal Officials Probing Duck Boat Sinking Focus on Weather Warnings," 22 July 2018 Yeah, this has been sort of an area peopled by a lot of big competitors; Symantec, and others, over the years. — Eric Johnson, Recode, "Nobody trusts Facebook anymore. Here’s one way it could change that.," 15 Oct. 2018 Even the fictional world was peopled with powerhouse women: Murphy Brown, Buffy, and Khadijah James in Living Single, to name a few. — Rhaina Cohen, The New Republic, "What the 1990s Got Wrong," 29 June 2018 The handsome two-bedroom apartment functions as a shrine to a different New York, a different Hollywood: when movies were about silver screens, not touch-screens; when those who peopled them were stars, not celebrities. — Alex Williams, New York Times, "Rex Reed Bangs a Gong on the Mediocrity of Modern Life," 10 Jan. 2018 These stories are funny and moving and peopled by Southern characters grappling with privilege, tradition, and stasis. — Caroline Rogers, Southern Living, "10 Books by Southern Writers We Bet You Haven’t Read Yet," 29 June 2018 Detroit’s history is peopled with great names, from Judge Woodward and Chief Pontiac to Walter Reuther and Coleman A. Young. — John Gallagher, Detroit Free Press, "Detroit train station is city's biggest comeback moment yet," 15 June 2018These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'people.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
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More Definitions for people
people
noun
English Language Learners Definition of people
(Entry 1 of 2)
: individual human beings
: human beings as a group : all or most people
: a group of people who share a quality, interest, etc.
people
verbEnglish Language Learners Definition of people (Entry 2 of 2)
formal
of people
: to live or be in (a place)
: to put people in (something, such as a story)
See the full definition for people in the English Language Learners Dictionary