the vast majority
355
2.6
- noun
:
gran mayoría
- The vast majority of Americans expect me to keep my head and save them from this awful mess.
- in the vast majority of cases
- the vast majority of people
- the vast majority of research
But I also think that the vast majority of Americans are against it.
- But I also think that the vast majority of Americans are against it.
- They do so precisely by ignoring the vast majority of people's experiences.
- We had the Teamsters union that that controlled the vast majority of employee jobs.
- Then the vast majority of men are taller than women.
- As you skim them, you'll immediately notice that the vast majority are sight words.
- They don't always say yes, but the vast majority do.
- It's either jail or treatment doesn't make any sense when the vast majority of people don't need either.
Examples
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The vast majority of students passed the exam with flying colors.
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But I also think that the vast majority of Americans are against it.
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All right, The vast majority of people are employees.
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So now let me say again, the vast majority of people online are great.
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And so does the vast majority of the American people!
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But in the vast majority of cases, the red flags were there.
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Yes, for the vast majority of folks that is the easiest thing to do.
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But what we see is that the vast majority of people regain that weight.
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That's why the vast majority of people are better off buying index funds.
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Blue states generate the vast majority of America's gross domestic product.
Synonyms
∞
2.1
More than half of the people or things in a group
Antonyms
How Many
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'nearly all' is directly and transparently derived from combining 'vast' (very large) with 'majority' (the larger portion of a group); the determiner 'the' is just grammatical. This compositional pattern is common and predictable (and found cross-linguistically), so a B1 learner who knows the constituent words should understand the expression.
Etymology
The vast majority joins vast, meaning very large, and majority, meaning the bigger part of a group, creating the image of a huge crowd where almost everyone is together. That's why it means 'nearly all'.