A cent is one one-hundredth of a dollar, a very small unit of American currency. The word comes from the Latin centum, meaning “hundred.”

When you have 100 cents, you have exactly one dollar. A penny is worth one cent, a nickel is worth five cents, a dime is worth ten cents, and a quarter is worth twenty-five cents. If something costs $1.50, that's the same as saying it costs 150 cents.

The cent symbol (¢) appears less often today than it once did, but you'll still see prices like 99¢ or expressions like my two cents, meaning “my opinion.” When someone says something isn't worth two cents, they mean it has very little value.

Many other countries use cents too, dividing their main currency into 100 smaller units. Canada uses cents with its dollar, many countries in Europe use cents with the euro, and Australia uses cents with the Australian dollar. While different countries' cents have different values when compared to each other, they all share the same basic idea: 100 of them equal one of the main currency units.