Zipf's Law: The Top Word Appears Twice as Often as the Second
In almost any large text, word frequencies follow a remarkably strict mathematical ranking.
📊 Statistics & Odds
Plus Magazine (University of Cambridge)
According to Zipf's Law, the 10th most common word appears at what percentage of the 1st word's frequency?
Speakers favor brief, frequent words while listeners need precision; this communicative trade-off naturally produces a power law.
📊 Statistics
Statistics & Odds
Why / How?
Scientific Mechanism
Discovered by linguist George Zipf, this power law shows the nth most common word appears roughly 1/n as often as the most frequent word. The same distribution emerges in city populations, website traffic, and corporate sizes.
Why It Matters
Speakers favor brief, frequent words while listeners need precision; this communicative trade-off naturally produces a power law.
