the property of relative size or extent (whether large or small); they tried to predict the magnitude of the explosion; about the magnitude of a small pea'

a number assigned to the ratio of two quantities; two quantities are of the same order of magnitude if one is less than 10 times as large as the other; the number of magnitudes that the quantities differ is specified to within a power of 10

[ Syn: order of magnitude ]

relative importance; a problem of the first magnitude'