millisecond

noun

mil·​li·​sec·​ond ˈmi-lə-ˌse-kənd 

-kənt

: one thousandth of a second

Did you know?

A millisecond isn't long enough for the blink of an eye, but a few milliseconds may determine the winner of a swim race or a hundred-yard dash. With the ever-increasing speed of modern technology, even a millisecond has started to seem a little sluggish; computer operations are now measured in nanoseconds—that is, billionths of a second.

Examples of millisecond in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Seltz’s system crawls hundreds of millions of pages a day, and returns results in under 200 milliseconds. — Jeremy Kahn, Fortune, 24 June 2026

Measured that way, the older E Ink screens on Glider come in around 100 milliseconds. — IEEE Spectrum, 18 June 2026

This jump-start meant a mobile phone could theoretically lock on to the GPS signal within milliseconds. — Literary Hub, 17 June 2026

In regulatory contexts where risk positions can change within milliseconds, this is a silent material deficiency. — Lev Yatsemyrskyi, Forbes.com, 30 June 2026

Word History

Etymology

International Scientific Vocabulary

First Known Use

1909, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for millisecond

• femtosecond
• microsecond
• nanosecond
• picosecond
• beckoned
• reckoned
• second
• seconde

Kids Definition

millisecond

noun

mil·​li·​sec·​ond ˈmil-ə-ˌsek-ənd 

also -ənt

: one thousandth of a second

Medical Definition

millisecond

noun

mil·​li·​sec·​ond ˈmil-ə-ˌsek-ənd, -ənt 

: one thousandth of a second

—abbreviation ms, msec