increment

The action of increasing or becoming greater.

Noun

  1. The action of increasing or becoming greater.
    • the seminary that furnisheth matter for the formation and increment of animal and vegetable bodies - 1695, John Woodward, “(please specify the page)”, in An Essay toward a Natural History of the Earth: And Terrestrial...
    • A nation, to be great, ought to be compressed in its increment by nations more civilized than itself—as Greece by Persia; and Rome by Etruria, the Italian states, and Carthage. - 1832 June 9, Samuel Taylor Coleridge,...
  2. The amount of increase.
    • In the third place, the superelevation and alignment of the track, theoretically calculated for speeds of 70 to 75 m.p.h., was adequate for the 80 to 85 m.p.h. or so normally attained as maxima over the G.N. main line;...
    • The others will return at night, [...] pushing their experiments and nudging their projects toward completion in small, painful increments. - 2020, Brandon Taylor, Real Life, Daunt Books Originals, page 90:
  3. An amplification without strict climax, as in the following passage: "Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report, […] think on these things."
  4. The amount of time added to a player's clock after each move.
  5. A syllable in excess of the number of the nominative singular or the second-person singular present indicative.

Origin

From Middle English encrement, increment, from Latin incrēmentum, from incrēscō (whence increase), from in- + crēscō (“grow”). Equivalent to increase + -ment.

Forms

increments

Synonyms

enlargement expansion addition supplement

Antonyms

decrement

Related

increase

Derived

autoincrement incremence incremental increment borer in increment microincrement post-increment pre-increment unearned increment

Verb

  1. To increase by steps or by a step, especially by one.
    • ... any given value just before observing, the actual pressures must as frequently be incremented as decremented, both in the "on" and the "off" series. - 1890, H. E. J. G. Du Bois, “On Magnetic Circuits”, in...
    • public sector professional services recruitment, has seen a strong seasonal upturn which has incremented year on year since 2002 by an average of 12%. - 2007 January 23, “Busiest two weeks for recruiters”, in Recruiter...
    • The first for loop looks at each word in the input line, incrementing the element of array num subscripted by the word. - 1984, Brian W. Kernighan with Rob Pike, The UNIX programming environment, page 124:

Forms

increments incrementing incremented

Antonyms

decrement

Derived

autoincrement incrementable incrementation incrementer incrementor unincremented