area

Noun

1. A measure of the extent of a surface; it is measured in square units.
   • It is about 4.5 million square kilometers in area and holds the world’s third largest collection of ice after Antarctica and Greenland. - 2018, VOA Learning English > China's Melting Glacier Brings Visitors, Adds to...
2. A particular geographic region.
   • Eggimann used a computer algorithm to analyze data from the open-source geographic database OpenStreetMap and automatically detect areas with the superblock potential. He applied this analysis to 5 km x 5 km areas of...
3. Any particular extent of surface, especially an empty or unused extent.
   • The photo is a little dark in that area.
4. The extent, scope, or range of an object or concept.
   • The plans are a bit vague in that area.
   • Today, a new area of research that similarly aims to mimic a complex biological phenomenon—life itself—is taking off. Synthetic biology, a seductive experimental subfield in the life sciences, seems tantalizingly to...
   • The Green-Tao theorem on primes was a similar collaboration. Green is a specialist in an area called number theory, and Tao originally trained in an area called harmonic analysis. - 2015 July 24, Gareth Cook, “The...
5. An open space, below ground level, giving access to the basement of a house, and typically separated from the pavement by railings.
   • A boy seized it, whom she bribed with a shilling to relinquish his prize, which she was taking home, when it escaped from her hand, and fell down the area of a house. - 1790, Helen Maria Williams, Julia, Routledge,...
   • This was so favourably received by the milkman and beadle that he would immediately have been pushed into the area if I had not held his pinafore while Richard and Mr. Guppy ran down through the kitchen to catch him...
   • He crept down the back stairs; but as he could not quite condescend to escape through the area, he was forced to emerge upon the hall, and here his aunt pounced upon him, coming out of the breakfast-parlour. - 1865,...
6. Penalty box; penalty area.
   • Bendtner's goal-bound shot was well saved by goalkeeper Ali Al Habsi but fell to Arsahvin on the edge of the area and the Russian swivelled, shaped his body and angled a sumptuous volley into the corner. - 2010 December...
7. Genitals.
   • But what do I do when the third one runs at me with his bike helmet on? I got no more hands to protect my area! - 2003 October 2, “The One Where Ross Is Fine”, in Friends, season 10, episode 2, spoken by Frank Buffay...