brown.
A colour like that of chocolate or coffee.
Meaning & usage
A colour like that of chocolate or coffee.
The browns and greens in this painting give it a nice woodsy feel.
He wore brown jeans for his birthday.
One of the colour balls used in snooker, with a value of 4 points.
Black tar heroin.
A copper coin.
A brown horse or other animal.
A person of mostly Latin American (or Latino), Middle Eastern/North African, South Asian, and sometimes Southeast Asian, Pacific Islander, or rarely Native American descent; a brown-skinned person; someone of mulatto, or biracial appearance.
Any of various nymphalid butterflies of subfamily Satyrinae (formerly the family Satyridae), such as those of the genera Heteronympha and Melanitis.
A brown trout (Salmo trutta).
A mass of birds or animals that may be indiscriminately fired at.
A brown dye or pigment.
A pen, pencil, crayon, etc., made of brown pigment.
Where this word comes from
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *bʰerH-? Proto-Germanic *brūnaz Proto-West Germanic *brūn Old English brūn Middle English broun English brown Inherited from Middle English broun, from Old English brūn (“brown; dark; dusky”), from Proto-West Germanic *brūn, from Proto-Germanic *brūnaz, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰerH-. Doublet of bruin. Cognates * Dutch bruin * German braun * Danish, Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk, and Swedish brun * Ancient Greek φρύνη (phrúnē), φρῦνος (phrûnos, “toad”) * Latin brunneus (“brown”) * Lithuanian bė́ras (“brown”) * Sanskrit बभ्रु (babhrú, “reddish-brown”) * West Frisian brún
Having a brown color/colour.
Gloomy.
Of or relating to any of various ethnic groups having dark pigmentation of the skin. Latino/Latin American
Of or relating to any of various ethnic groups having dark pigmentation of the skin. of color.
Of or relating to any of various ethnic groups having dark pigmentation of the skin. South Asian or sometimes Middle Eastern or North African
Of or relating to any of various ethnic groups having dark pigmentation of the skin. Southeast Asian, Pacific Islander, or sometimes Native American
Not green (environmentally irresponsible); anti-green (against environmental protection).
Where this word comes from
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *bʰerH-? Proto-Germanic *brūnaz Proto-West Germanic *brūn Old English brūn Middle English broun English brown Inherited from Middle English broun, from Old English brūn (“brown; dark; dusky”), from Proto-West Germanic *brūn, from Proto-Germanic *brūnaz, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰerH-. Doublet of bruin. Cognates * Dutch bruin * German braun * Danish, Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk, and Swedish brun * Ancient Greek φρύνη (phrúnē), φρῦνος (phrûnos, “toad”) * Latin brunneus (“brown”) * Lithuanian bė́ras (“brown”) * Sanskrit बभ्रु (babhrú, “reddish-brown”) * West Frisian brún
To become brown.
Fry the onions until they brown.
Synonym of poop (“to defecate”).
I've just browned myself.
To cook something until it becomes brown.
To tan.
Light-skinned people tend to brown when exposed to the sun.
To make brown or dusky.
To give a bright brown colour to, as to gun barrels, by forming a thin coating of oxide on their surface.
To turn progressively more Hispanic or Latino, in the context of the population of a geographic region.
the browning of America
Where this word comes from
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *bʰerH-? Proto-Germanic *brūnaz Proto-West Germanic *brūn Old English brūn Middle English broun English brown Inherited from Middle English broun, from Old English brūn (“brown; dark; dusky”), from Proto-West Germanic *brūn, from Proto-Germanic *brūnaz, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰerH-. Doublet of bruin. Cognates * Dutch bruin * German braun * Danish, Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk, and Swedish brun * Ancient Greek φρύνη (phrúnē), φρῦνος (phrûnos, “toad”) * Latin brunneus (“brown”) * Lithuanian bė́ras (“brown”) * Sanskrit बभ्रु (babhrú, “reddish-brown”) * West Frisian brún
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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.