broad.
Wide in extent or scope.
Meaning & usage
Wide in extent or scope.
three feet broad
the broad expanse of ocean
Extended, in the sense of diffused; open; clear; full.
Having a large measure of any thing or quality; unlimited; unrestrained.
Comprehensive; liberal; enlarged.
Plain; evident.
a broad hint
General rather than specific.
to be in broad agreement
Unsubtle; obvious.
Free; unrestrained; unconfined.
Gross; coarse; indelicate.
a broad compliment; a broad joke; broad humour
Strongly regional.
She still has a broad Scottish accent, despite moving to California 20 years ago.
Velarized, i.e. not palatalized.
Where this word comes from
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *bʰer-der.? Proto-Germanic *braidaz Proto-West Germanic *braid Old English brād Middle English brod English broad From Middle English brood, brode, from Old English brād (“broad, flat, open, extended, spacious, wide, ample, copious”), from Proto-West Germanic *braid, from Proto-Germanic *braidaz (“broad, wide”), of uncertain origin. Cognates Cognate with Yola brode (“broad”), North Frisian bread, breeđ, briad, briid, briidj (“wide”), Saterland Frisian and West Frisian breed (“broad, wide”), Bavarian brad, broad (“broad, wide”), Central Franconian and Luxembourgish breet (“broad, wide”), Dutch breed (“broad, wide”), German breit (“broad, wide”), Vilamovian braat (“broad, wide”), Yiddish ברייט (breyt, “broad, wide”), Danish and Swedish bred (“broad, wide”), Faroese and Icelandic breiður (“broad, wide”), Norwegian Bokmål bred, brei (“broad, wide”), Norwegian Nynorsk brei, breid (“broad, wide”), Gothic 𐌱𐍂𐌰𐌹𐌸𐍃 (braiþs, “broad, wide”).
A shallow lake, one of a number of bodies of water in eastern Norfolk and Suffolk.
A lathe tool for turning down the insides and bottoms of cylinders.
A British gold coin worth 20 shillings, issued by the Commonwealth of England in 1656.
A kind of floodlight.
A playing card.
Where this word comes from
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *bʰer-der.? Proto-Germanic *braidaz Proto-West Germanic *braid Old English brād Middle English brod English broad From Middle English brood, brode, from Old English brād (“broad, flat, open, extended, spacious, wide, ample, copious”), from Proto-West Germanic *braid, from Proto-Germanic *braidaz (“broad, wide”), of uncertain origin. Cognates Cognate with Yola brode (“broad”), North Frisian bread, breeđ, briad, briid, briidj (“wide”), Saterland Frisian and West Frisian breed (“broad, wide”), Bavarian brad, broad (“broad, wide”), Central Franconian and Luxembourgish breet (“broad, wide”), Dutch breed (“broad, wide”), German breit (“broad, wide”), Vilamovian braat (“broad, wide”), Yiddish ברייט (breyt, “broad, wide”), Danish and Swedish bred (“broad, wide”), Faroese and Icelandic breiður (“broad, wide”), Norwegian Bokmål bred, brei (“broad, wide”), Norwegian Nynorsk brei, breid (“broad, wide”), Gothic 𐌱𐍂𐌰𐌹𐌸𐍃 (braiþs, “broad, wide”).
A prostitute, a woman of loose morals.
A woman or girl.
Where this word comes from
Early 20th century, apparent phono-semantic matching of German Braut (“bride”, also “girlfriend”, and more generally “broad, chick”).
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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.
Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.