millimeter

American  

[mil-uh-mee-ter] / ˈmɪl əˌmi tər /

especially British, millimetre

noun

1. a unit of length equal to one thousandth of a meter and equivalent to 0.03937 inch. mm

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millimeter Scientific  

/ mĭl′ə-mē′tər /

1. A unit of length in the metric system equal to 0.001 meter.

2. See Table at measurement

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Other Word Forms

• millimetric adjective

Etymology

Origin of millimeter

First recorded in 1800–10; from French millimètre; milli-, meter ¹

Example Sentences

The bugs, measuring two to three millimeters, are so small they can be hard to see.

From Los Angeles Times

The foam head atop a beer should measure 18 to 22 millimeters.

From The Wall Street Journal

Wrinkle structures are tiny ridges and pits ranging from millimeters to centimeters across.

From Science Daily

The system can measure movements as small as a few millimeters caused by slow geological processes such as landslides or ground subsidence.

From Science Daily

For scale, a nanometer is one millionth of a millimeter.

From Science Daily