English

Adverb

on the order of

1. (often followed by a number) Approximately.
   • 2009 Aug. 6, Maria Bartiromo , "Eric Schmidt on Where Google Is Headed," Businessweek (retrieved 16 June 2014):

     [T]he rough number of mobile phones is on the order of 3 billion.

   • 2013 July 15, Glenn Greenwald, "The crux of the NSA story in one phrase: 'collect it all'," The Guardian (UK) (retrieved 16 June 2014):

     Still another former NSA whistleblower, the mathematician William Binney, has said that the NSA has "assembled on the order of 20 trillion transactions about US citizens with other US citizens".

Preposition

on the order of

1. In the manner of; along the lines of; like; of a similar kind to; more-or-less equivalent to.
   • 1919, Elbert Hubbard, Little Journeys: Vol. 9—Great Reformers, "John Wesley":

     [H]is philanthropy was more on the order of that of Jack Cade than it was Christian.

   • 1959 Dec. 17, Bosley Crowther, "Journey to the Center of the Earth" (film review), New York Times (retrieved 16 June 2014):

     The earth's interior is somewhat on the order of an elaborate amusement-park tunnel of love.

   • 2013 Dec. 16, Bill Saporito, "Ford Is Back in the Saddle with New Mustang," Time (retrieved 16 June 2014):

     Calling Ford's muscle car an iconic, era-defining product on the order of Sony's Walkman or Apple's iPhone isn't a stretch.

Synonyms

• OTOO (initialism)

References

• on the order of at OneLook Dictionary Search