discrepancy

What it means

1. countableuncountableAn inconsistency between facts or sentiments.

   They found a discrepancy between the first set of test results and the second, and they're still trying to figure out why.

   2 more examples

   Still, there is pilferage, mysterious discrepancies eating into the percentages.

   1981, John Updike, Rabbit is Rich

   WikiLeaks did not cause these uprisings but it certainly informed them. The dispatches revealed details of corruption and kleptocracy that many Tunisians suspected, […]. They also exposed the blatant discrepancy between the west's professed values and actual foreign policies.

   2013 June 7, Gary Younge, “Hypocrisy lies at heart of Manning prosecution”, in The Guardian Weekly, volume 188, number 26, archived from the original on 06 Jun 2019, page 18

   Synonyms: conflict, contrariety, deviation, difference, disagreement, disparity, divergence, incompatibility

2. countableuncountableThe state or quality of being discrepant.

   Synonyms: discordance, anomalous

In a sentence

They found a discrepancy between the first set of test results and the second, and they're still trying to figure out why.

Where it comes from

1. Proto-Indo-European*dwóh₁
2. Proto-Indo-European*trísinflu.
3. Proto-Indo-European*d(w)is-
4. Proto-Italic*dis-
5. Latindis-
6. Latincrepō
7. Latindiscrepō
8. Latindiscrepāns
9. Latindiscrepantia
10. Englishdiscrepancy

Borrowed from Latin discrepantia, from discrepans, from discrepō, from crepō. By surface analysis, discrepant + -cy. See also discrepant.