Points

How to spell points

6 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce points

What does points mean?

1. nounSeparate units, marks, scores, ideas, or precise spots considered together.
2. verbIndicates a direction or draws attention to something, as one person does.
3. nounThe movable rails that guide a train from one track to another.

Points in a sentence

• noun

  The winning team finished the season with the most points on the table.

• verb

  The signpost points toward the motorway exit.

• noun

  The train was delayed because the points outside the station had frozen.

• noun

  She made several strong points during the budget meeting.

• verb

  Every piece of evidence points to the same conclusion.

• noun

  Engineers replaced the worn points on the junction overnight.

Where does points come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin verb pungere, meaning 'to prick' or 'to pierce', and its past participle form punctum, which literally meant 'a pricked spot' or 'a tiny dot made by piercing'. As Latin developed into Old French, punctum became point, carrying senses ranging from a dot to a sharp tip to a precise moment or place. English borrowed the word during the 1200s and 1300s, and it quickly branched into a remarkable range of meanings: a dot in writing, the sharp end of a needle, a unit in scoring a game, and a specific spot in space or time. The verb sense, meaning to indicate direction with a finger or a marker, grew from the same idea of singling out one precise spot. The plural and third-person forms simply add -s, and because the word is short and phonetically regular, the spelling has stayed remarkably stable for centuries.

How the word is built

• point (a sharp tip, mark, or unit)
• -s (plural / third-person singular ending)