EU5 Glossary: Every Term, Defined Once

A single reference for every EU5-specific term used across our guide (control, estates, institutions, markets, and more), so you're not hunting definitions across a dozen pages.

Every term below links to the full explainer where one exists, so you can go from "what does this word mean" to "how does the system actually work" in one click.

Core terms, A-Z
Term	Definition
Control	A location-level measure of how firmly your government administers a territory, distinct from ownership. It directly scales effective tax base and levy contribution from that location. See control percentage explained.
Crown authority	A monarchy's institutional power relative to its estates: the axis that determines how much a ruler can push through without provoking estate backlash. See estates and crown authority.
Estate satisfaction	How content a given estate (nobility, clergy, burghers, etc.) is with the crown's current policies. Drifts toward an equilibrium set by granted privileges; the official wiki puts the flip from bonuses to penalties at 50% satisfaction. See estate satisfaction vs crown power.
Estates	The organized political bodies (nobility, clergy, burghers, and others depending on government type) that share power with the crown and must be managed rather than ignored. See estates and crown authority.
Feitorias	Portugal's unique trade building, providing local trade bonuses. Central to the Portuguese early-game economic identity. See the Portugal strategy guide.
Formable nation	A tag unlockable by an existing nation once specific territorial and other requirements are met, replacing it with a new (often stronger) national identity. See formable nations: full requirements list.
Institution	A historical-era technology/administrative shift (e.g. a new military or governance paradigm) that spreads location-by-location across the map over time rather than unlocking instantly. Falling behind on institution spread costs efficiency across the board. See why your institution won't spread.
Location	EU5's base map subdivision, smaller and more granular than EU4's provinces, used as the unit for control, population, and trade-good output.
Market Center	The location a market is based in and named after, though the market itself extends beyond it. Which market a given location joins is decided by that market's Market Attraction and Market Protection against the location's own Market Access to it. This replaced EU4's fixed trade nodes; EU5 has no trade nodes at all. See trade and market system explained.
Personal union	Two nations sharing a single ruler without merging into one country, typically arising from a marriage union and an inherited heir. The stronger partner can hold seniority. See the Hungary strategy guide for a worked example.
Population engine	EU5's headline system simulating individual people rather than an abstracted population pool: the main driver of the game's higher RAM requirements. See population growth system explained and system requirements.
Tax base	The underlying value a location's tax income is calculated from, separate from the raw tax rate: the actual lever behind "how much money does this territory make me." See tax base and minting explained.

Missing a term you expected to see here? This page grows with every new mechanic page we publish. Check back, or see the full EU5 guide for the complete page index in the meantime.

EU5 Glossary: Every Term, Defined Once

Sources