Collins COBUILD Advanced Learner's English Dictionary - ocean

(oceans) Frequency: The word is one of the 3000 most common words in English. 1. The ocean is the sea. There were few sights as beautiful as the calm ocean on a warm night. N-SING: the N 2. An ocean is one of the five very large areas of sea on the Earth’s surface. They spent many days cruising the northern Pacific Ocean. ...the Indian Ocean. N-COUNT; N-IN-NAMES 3. If you say that there is an ocean of something, you are emphasizing that there is a very large amount of it. (INFORMAL) I had cried oceans of tears... APEC seems be drowning in an ocean of jargon. N-COUNT: N of n c darkgreen]emphasis 4. If you say that something is a drop in the ocean, you mean that it is a very small amount which is unimportant compared to the cost of other things or is so small that it has very little effect on something. His fee is a drop in the ocean compared with the real cost of broadcasting. PHRASE: usu v-link PHR c darkgreen]emphasis