Learn English – “In their thousands” and “in the thousands”

idiomatic-languagemeaning-in-contextphrase-meaning

Do they mean the exact same thing? Any nuances?

To borrow the Macmillan Dictionary's example:

Londoners came out on the streets in their thousands.

may well be phrased as

Londoners came out on the streets in the thousands.

Right?

Best Answer

in their thousands can mean a grouping of people, implying that they all came out for the same purpose. It can also mean a grouping as compared to other groups, i.e.,

The Londoners came out in their thousands, the Berliners in their millions, but the aliens came in their billions, and overwhelmed them.

The phrase in the thousands is specifically specifying quantity. Perhaps there is a cause for them to be numbered together, but their following actions may be different. E.g.,

The Londoners came out in the thousands. Some came out to escape the heat of their top-floor flats, while others came to observe narrowly the tawdry parade going before them. The children, of course, came out for the hard candies thrown out the sides of the colorful carriages.

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