cold.
Having a low temperature.
Meaning & usage
Having a low temperature.
A cold wind whistled through the trees.
Causing the air to be cold.
The forecast is that it will be very cold today.
Feeling the sensation of coldness, especially to the point of discomfort.
She was so cold she was shivering.
Unfriendly; emotionally distant or unfeeling.
She shot me a cold glance before turning her back.
Chilled, filled with an uncomfortable sense of fear, dread, or alarm.
Dispassionate; not prejudiced or partisan; impartial.
Let's look at this tomorrow with a cold head.
He's a nice guy, but the cold facts say we should fire him.
Completely unprepared; without introduction.
He was assigned cold calls for the first three months.
Unconscious or deeply asleep; deprived of the metaphorical heat associated with life or consciousness.
I knocked him out cold.
After one more beer he passed out cold.
Perfectly, exactly, completely; by heart; down pat.
Practice your music scales until you know them cold.
Try both these maneuvers until you have them cold and can do them in the dark without thinking.
Cornered; done for.
With that receipt, we have them cold for fraud.
Criminal interrogation. Initially they will dream up explanations faster than you could ever do so, but when they become fatigued, often they will acknowledge that you have them cold.
Cool, impressive.
Not pungent or acrid.
Unexciting; dull; uninteresting.
Affecting the sense of smell (as of hunting dogs) only feebly; having lost its odour.
a cold scent
Not sensitive; not acute.
Distant; said, in the game of hunting for some object, of a seeker remote from the thing concealed. Compare warm and hot.
You're cold … getting warmer … hot! You've found it!
Having a bluish effect; not warm in colour.
Rarely used or accessed, and thus able to be relegated to slower storage.
Without compassion; heartless; ruthless.
I can't believe she said that...that was cold!
Not radioactive.
Not loaded with a round of live ammunition.
Without electrical power being supplied.
Where this word comes from
Inherited from Middle English cold, from Anglian Old English cald. The West Saxon form, ċeald (“cold”), survived as early Middle English cheald, cheld, or chald. Both descended from Proto-West Germanic *kald, from Proto-Germanic *kaldaz (“cold”), a participle form of *kalaną (“to be cold, to freeze”), from Proto-Indo-European *gel- (“to be cold, to freeze”). Cognates Cognate with Scots cauld (“cold”), Saterland Frisian koold (“cold”), West Frisian kâld (“cold”), Alemannic German chalt, choalt, cholt, chélte (“cold”), Bavarian ckolt, kholt, koid, kòlt (“cold”), Central Franconian kalt (“cold”), Cimbrian kalt, khalt (“cold”), Dutch koud (“cold”), German kalt (“cold”), Low German kold, koolt (“cold”), Luxembourgish kal (“cold”), Mòcheno khòlt, kòlt (“cold”), Vilamovian kāłt (“cold”), Yiddish קאַלט (kalt, “cold”), Danish kold (“cold”), Faroese and Icelandic kaldur (“cold”), Norwegian Bokmål kald (“cold”), Norwegian Nynorsk kald, kald’u (“cold”), Swedish kall (“cold”), Gothic 𐌺𐌰𐌻𐌳𐍃 (kalds, “cold”); also Latin gelū, gelum, gelus (“frost; chill, cold”), Belarusian хо́лад (xólad, “cold”), Bulgarian хлад (hlad, “chill, coolness”), Czech chlad (“cold”), Macedonian лад (lad, “shade; coolness”), Polish chłód (“cold”), Russian and Ukrainian хо́лод (xólod, “cold”), Serbo-Croatian хла̑д, hlȃd (“shade”), Sanskrit जड (jaḍa, “cold; stiff”), जल (jala, “water”). Related to cool.
A condition of low temperature.
Come in, out of the cold.
A harsh place; a place of abandonment.
The former politician was left out in the cold after his friends deserted him.
A common, usually harmless, usually viral illness, usually with congestion of the nasal passages and sometimes fever.
I caught a miserable cold and had to stay home for a week
Rheum; sleepy dust.
Where this word comes from
Inherited from Middle English cold, colde, from Old English cald, ċeald (“cold, coldness”), from Proto-West Germanic *kald, from Proto-Germanic *kaldą (“coldness”), from Proto-Indo-European *gel- (“cold”). Cognates Cognate with Saterland Frisian Keelde (“cold”), West Frisian kjeld (“cold”), Dutch koude (“cold”), German Low German Kolle, Koll (“cold”), German Kälte (“cold”), Danish kulde (“cold”), Swedish köld (“cold”), Norwegian kulde (“cold”), Icelandic kuldi (“cold”).
At a low temperature.
The steel was processed cold.
Without preparation.
The speaker went in cold and floundered for a topic.
In a cold, frank, or realistically honest manner.
Where this word comes from
Inherited from Middle English colde, from Old English calde, ċealde (“coldly”), from the adjective (see above).
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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.