Chance

Pronunciation

• RP IPA: /tʃɑːns/
• US IPA: /tʃæns/
• Rhymes: -ɑːns
• Rhymes: -æns

Alternative forms

• chaunce obsolete

Origin

From Old French cheance ("accident, chance, luck"), from Vulgar Latin cadentia ("falling"), from Latin cadō ("I fall, I die"). See also cadence, from the same Latin root.

Full definition of chance

Noun

1. (countable) An opportunity or possibility.
• 1898, Winston Churchill, The Celebrity Chapter 2, Here was my chance. I took the old man aside, and two or three glasses of Old Crow launched him into reminiscence.
2. We had the chance to meet the president last week.
3. (uncountable) Random occurrence; luck.
   Why leave it to chance when a few simple steps will secure the desired outcome?
4. (countable) The probability of something happening.
   There is a 30% chance of rain tomorrow.

Derived terms

Verb

1. (archaic, intransitive) To happen by chance, to occur.It chanced that I found a solution the very next day.
• Bible, Deuteronomy xxii. 6if a bird's nest chance to be before thee
• ShakespeareI chanced on this letter.
• 1843, Thomas Carlyle, Past and Present, book 2, ch. XV, Practical — DevotionalOnce ... it chanced that Geoffrey Riddell Bishop of Ely, a Prelate rather troublesome to our Abbot, made a request of him for timber from his woods towards certain edifices going on at Glemsford.
• 1847, Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre, Chapter XVIIIMr. Mason, shivering as some one chanced to open the door, asked for more coal to be put on the fire, which had burnt out its flame, though its mass of cinder still shone hot and red. The footman who brought the coal, in going out, stopped near Mr. Eshton's chair, and said something to him in a low voice, of which I heard only the words, "old woman,"—"quite troublesome."
2. (archaic, transitive) To befall; to happen to.
3. To try or risk.Shall we carry the umbrella, or chance a rainstorm?
• W. D. HowellsCome what will, I will chance it.
4. To discover something by chance.He chanced upon a kindly stranger who showed him the way.

Derived terms

• chance on
• chance upon

Adjective

1. (rare) Happening by chance, casual.
• 1859, Charles Dickens, A Tale of Two Cities, ch. VI, The Shoe Maker (Heron Book Centenial Edition)No crowd was about the door; no people were discernible at any of the many windows; not even a chance passer-by was in the street. An unnatural silence and desertion reigned there.