foo.
A metasyntactic variable used to represent an unspecified entity. If part of a series of such entities, it is often the first in the series, and followed immediately by bar.
Meaning & usage
A metasyntactic variable used to represent an unspecified entity. If part of a series of such entities, it is often the first in the series, and followed immediately by bar.
Suppose we have two objects, foo and bar.
Alternative letter-case form of Foo (“placeholder god”).
Where this word comes from
From Chinese 福 (fú, “fortunate; prosperity, good luck”), via its use as 福星 (Fúxīng, “Jupiter”) in Chinese statues of the Three Lucky Stars, picked up from c. 1935 as a nonsense word in Bill Holman's Smokey Stover comic strip, whence it was picked up by Pogo, Looney Tunes, and others. Used by Jack Speer as the name of a mock god of mimeography in the 1930s. Popularized in computing contexts by the Tech Model Railroad Club's 1959 Dictionary of the TMRC Language, which incorporated it into a parody of the Buddhist chant om mani padme hum, possibly under the influence of WWII military slang FUBAR, which had been repopularized by Joseph Heller's Catch-22.
Expression of disappointment or disgust.
Oh foo – the cake burnt!
Where this word comes from
A minced form of fuck.
Alternative form of fu: an administrative subdivision of imperial China; the capital of such divisions.
Where this word comes from
From Mandarin 府 (fǔ).
Pronunciation spelling of fool.
Try it on your idea.
foo has 3 characters. Say it out loud, try it alongside a description of your project, and see whether its meaning fits what you want to create.
These are naming prompts. Meanings and pronunciation can vary; existing brand and domain uses have not been checked.
Explore the name generatorA word with a source.
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.