DictionarymodeMost frequent value
noun

mode

A value that occurs most often in a set of data.

The mode of the data set is the value that appears most often.

Etymology

The Latin word supplied English senses involving a manner or prevailing form. Statistics specialized mode for the value that occurs most often in a distribution.

More examples

  • Two numbers shared the highest frequency, giving the set two modes.
  • She calculated the mean, median, and mode.
  • The mode was six because six appeared four times.

Forms

mode · modes

modal adjective — relating to the most frequent value

Similar words

mean
The arithmetic average rather than the most frequent value.
median
The middle value after ordering the data.