AVERAGE | English Meaning, Definition, and Pronunciation

late 15th century: from French avarie ‘damage to ship or cargo’, earlier ‘customs duty’, from Italian avaria, from Arabic ‘awār ‘damage to goods’; the suffix -age is on the pattern of damage. Originally denoting a duty payable by the owner of goods to be shipped, the term later denoted the financial liability from goods lost or damaged at sea, and specifically the equitable apportionment of this between the owners of the vessel and of the cargo (late 16th century); this gave rise to the general sense of calculating the mean (mid 18th century)

a number expressing the central or typical value in a set of data, in particular the mode, median, or (most commonly) the mean, which is calculated by dividing the sum of the values in the set by their number

number expressing the central or typical value in a set of data

• the proportion of over-60s is above the EU average of 19 per cent

the apportionment of financial liability resulting from loss of or damage to a ship or its cargo.

apportionment of liability

constituting the result obtained by adding together several amounts and then dividing this total by the number of amounts

constituting result found by dividing total amount

• the average temperature in May was 4°C below normal

amount to or achieve as an average rate or amount over a period of time; mean

amount to or achieve as average rate or amount over period of time

• annual inflation averaged 2.4 per cent