match.
Any contest or trial of strength or skill, or to determine superiority.
Meaning & usage
Any contest or trial of strength or skill, or to determine superiority.
Any contest or trial of strength or skill, or to determine superiority. A competitive sporting event such as a boxing meet, a baseball game, or a cricket match.
My local team are playing in a match against their arch-rivals today.
Equality of conditions in contest or competition.
A pair of items or entities with mutually suitable characteristics.
The carpet and curtains are a match.
a match made in heaven
A pair of items or entities with mutually suitable characteristics. Someone with a measure of an attribute equaling or exceeding the object of comparison.
He knew he had met his match.
A pair of items or entities with mutually suitable characteristics. Equivalence; a state of correspondence; a counterpart.
A pair of items or entities with mutually suitable characteristics. An agreement or compact.
A pair of items or entities with mutually suitable characteristics. A marriage.
A pair of items or entities with mutually suitable characteristics. A marriage. A candidate for matrimony; one to be gained in marriage.
Suitability.
A perforated board, block of plaster, hardened sand, etc., in which a pattern is partly embedded when a mould is made, for giving shape to the surfaces of separation between the parts of the mould.
Where this word comes from
From Middle English macche, mecche, from Old English mæċċa, ġemæċċa (“companion, mate, wife, one suited to another”), from Proto-West Germanic *makkjō, *gamakkjō (“partner, equal”), from Proto-Germanic *makô, from Proto-Indo-European *mag- (“to knead, work”). Compare Danish mage (“mate”), Icelandic maki (“spouse”).
To agree; to be equal; to correspond.
Their interests didn't match, so it took a long time to agree what to do together.
These two copies are supposed to be identical, but they don't match.
To agree with; to be equal to; to correspond to.
His interests didn't match her interests.
To equal or exceed in achievement.
She matched him at every turn: anything he could do, she could do as well or better.
To make a successful match or pairing.
They found out about his color-blindness when he couldn't match socks properly.
To unite in marriage, to mate.
To fit together, or make suitable for fitting together; specifically, to furnish with a tongue and groove at the edges.
to match boards
To be an example of a rule or regex.
The behavior matched one or more rules and was rejected by an edit filter.
Where this word comes from
From Middle English macchen (“to marry; be paired with”), from the noun (see above).
A small wooden stick specially treated with chemicals to produce flame upon contact with another chemical, from the frictional heat produced by striking it against a surface, or both; other similar items made from chemically-treated paper, cardboard, etc.
He struck a match and lit his pipe.
Synonym of taper, a thin stick used to transfer flame, as from tender to a candle.
Synonym of fuse, a long wick used to transfer flame to an explosive device.
Where this word comes from
Etymology tree Ancient Greek μύξα (múxa)bor. Latin myxa? Vulgar Latin micca Old French meschebor. Middle English mecche English match From Middle English macche, mecche (“wick (of a candle)”), from Old French mesche, meische, from Vulgar Latin micca (compare Catalan metxa, Spanish mecha, Italian miccia), which in turn is probably from Latin myxa (“nozzle, curved part of a lamp”), from Ancient Greek μύξα (múxa, “lamp wick”).
Try it on your idea.
match has 5 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.