as in calculation
the act or process of performing mathematical operations to find a value
he did a little number crunching and made an offer on the house
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Recent Examples of number crunching
In this case, instead of having equipment capable of all that processing power stored in massive warehouses, each satellite in orbit would do a small part of the number crunching and then beam the final results back to the ground.
—
Phil Plait, Scientific American, 6 Mar. 2026
Setting the odds for a game was more a matter of delicate intuition than wonkish number crunching.
—Dan Piepenbring, New Yorker, 4 Feb. 2026
Opponents said Antoni — who has spent most of his career at right-wing think tanks — lacked the expertise in statistical number crunching that's typical of previous BLS commissioners.
—Scott Horsley, NPR, 1 Oct. 2025
This will give decision makers essentially no choice but to deploy, and will give the fruits of your number crunching a chance to realize a business impact.
—Eric Siegel, Forbes.com, 8 Sep. 2025
Pretraining is where most of the number crunching happens, and what follows is usually fine-tuning, which refines the model for specific tasks.
—Dina Genkina, IEEE Spectrum, 4 June 2025
Phil Plait, Scientific American, 6 Mar. 2026
Setting the odds for a game was more a matter of delicate intuition than wonkish number crunching.
—Dan Piepenbring, New Yorker, 4 Feb. 2026
Opponents said Antoni — who has spent most of his career at right-wing think tanks — lacked the expertise in statistical number crunching that's typical of previous BLS commissioners.
—Scott Horsley, NPR, 1 Oct. 2025
This will give decision makers essentially no choice but to deploy, and will give the fruits of your number crunching a chance to realize a business impact.
—Eric Siegel, Forbes.com, 8 Sep. 2025
Pretraining is where most of the number crunching happens, and what follows is usually fine-tuning, which refines the model for specific tasks.
—Dina Genkina, IEEE Spectrum, 4 June 2025
Recent Examples of Synonyms for number crunching
Noun
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And that's when their calculations revealed that these animals were probably gargantuan — well larger than the giant Pacific octopus, today's biggest member of the family whose arm span often exceeds 13 feet.—
Ari Daniel,
NPR,
24 Apr. 2026
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The team evaluated the size of the ancient octopuses using allometric calculation—a method that used the proportional growth rates of modern, long-bodied finned octopuses to extrapolate the size of their extinct relatives.—
Jacek Krywko,
ArsTechnica,
24 Apr. 2026
Noun
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Zevik Glidai, a 78-year-old math teacher and volunteer ambulance driver, discovered coils of the translucent fiber-optic cables surrounding a drone that crashed into his backyard in the northern Israeli city of Kiryat Shmona on April 13.—
ABC News,
ABC News,
30 Apr. 2026
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Burton brought in a stethoscope, a scale, and a thermometer so that children could use the numbers for a math activity and demystify doctors’ visits.—
Tribune News Service,
Baltimore Sun,
30 Apr. 2026
Noun
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The arithmetic does not come close to closing a gap of this magnitude even under the most optimistic assumptions.—
Veronique De Rugy,
Oc Register,
13 Apr. 2026
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That figure is the cold arithmetic of economic gravity.—
Bobby Ghosh,
Time,
8 Apr. 2026
Noun
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The meeting between the two dignitaries will won’t include a livestreamed news conference like those the president has hosted with other international figures.—
Kathryn Palmer,
USA Today,
29 Apr. 2026
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The large monetary figures Ingoglia unveiled during each news conference came from analyses conducted by the state’s Department of Governmental Efficiency team, or DOGE, which had requested budget information from and visited many municipalities across the state.—
Abigail Hasebroock,
Sun Sentinel,
28 Apr. 2026
Cite this Entry
“Number crunching.” Merriam-Webster.com Thesaurus, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/thesaurus/number%20crunching. Accessed 2 May. 2026.
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