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I think you meant "lowest common denominator" or "most common denominator"...

• qsort 4y ago
  Wikipedia has both forms: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lowest_common_denominator https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lowest_common_denominator I'm not a native speaker - this is a genuine question - does it sound weird to say "least common denominator"?
  • zbentley 4y ago
    A little. While I have heard it (from native speakers and non), it's less common. I also find it confusing because "least" can be interpreted as "lowest", or it can be interpreted in context of the following word: "common". "Least common" (meaning infrequent or most rare) changes the meaning to one different and misleading compared to "lowest", which is why I interpret this phrasing as sounding weird.
  • jamesfinlayson 4y ago
    I think so? To me, least seems to be used for things like patience, distance, tidiness etc whereas lowest seems to be used more for money or countable things.
  • torstenvl 4y ago
    Native SAE-speaker here, studied linguistics in undergrad, and "least common denominator" is a perfectly normal construction. The web isn't a perfect corpus, and Google isn't a perfect corpus analysis tool, but with those caveats... Google results for "least common denominator": 738,000 / Google results for "most common denominator": 656,000 Additionally, as you point out, Wikipedia lists both as synonyms. Your original comment was correct and idiomatic English.