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ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

pin.

A needle without an eye (usually) made of drawn-out steel wire with one end sharpened and the other flattened or rounded into a head, used for fastening.

3 characters1 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/pɪn/Australia, Canada, Ireland, UK, US[ˈpʰɪn]Australia, Canada, Ireland, UK, US/pən/New-Zealand[ˈpʰən]New-Zealand
  1. A needle without an eye (usually) made of drawn-out steel wire with one end sharpened and the other flattened or rounded into a head, used for fastening.

  2. A small nail with a head and a sharp point.

  3. A cylindrical piece of solid material, often of wood or metal, used to fasten or as a bearing between two parts.

    Pull the pin out of the grenade before throwing it at the enemy.
  4. The victory condition of holding the opponent's shoulders on the wrestling mat for a prescribed period of time.

  5. A slender object specially designed for use in a specific game or sport, such as skittles or bowling.

  6. A leg.

    in-plural · informal
    I'm not so good on my pins these days.
  7. Any of the individual connecting elements of a multipole electrical connector.

    The UK standard connector for domestic mains electricity has three pins.
  8. A piece of jewellery that is attached to clothing with a pin.

  9. A simple accessory that can be attached to clothing with a pin or fastener, often round and bearing a design, logo or message, and used for decoration, identification or to show political affiliation, etc.

    US
  10. Either a scenario in which moving a lesser piece to escape from attack would expose a more valuable piece to being taken instead, or one where moving a piece is impossible as it would place the king in check.

  11. The flagstick: the flag-bearing pole which marks the location of a hole

  12. The spot at the exact centre of the house (the target area)

    The shot landed right on the pin.
  13. The spot at the exact centre of the target, originally a literal pin that fastened the target in place.

  14. A mood, a state of being.

    obsolete
  15. One of a row of pegs in the side of an ancient drinking cup to mark how much each person should drink.

  16. Caligo.

    obsolete
  17. A thing of small value; a trifle.

  18. A peg in musical instruments for increasing or relaxing the tension of the strings.

  19. A short shaft, sometimes forming a bolt, a part of which serves as a journal.

  20. The tenon of a dovetail joint.

  21. A size of brewery cask, equal to half a firkin, or eighth of a barrel.

    UK
  22. A pinball machine.

    informal
    I spent most of my time in the arcade playing pins.
  23. A small cylindrical object which blocks the rotation of a pin-tumbler lock when the incorrect key is inserted.

  24. An injection of PEDs.

    slang
Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Proto-Germanic *pinnaz Proto-West Germanic *pinn Old English pinn Middle English pinne English pin From Middle English pinne, from Old English pinn (“pin, peg, bolt”), from Proto-Germanic *pinnaz, *pinnō, *pint- (“protruding point, peak, peg, pin, nail”), from Proto-Indo-European *bend- (“protruding object, pointed peg, nail, edge”). Related to pen (“enclosure”). Cognate with Dutch pin (“peg, pin”), Low German pin, pinne (“pin, point, nail, peg”), German Pinn, Pinne (“pin, tack, peg”), Bavarian Pfonzer, Pfunzer (“sharpened point”), Danish pind (“pin, pointed stick”), Norwegian pinn (“stick”), Swedish pinne (“peg, rod, stick”), Icelandic pinni (“pin”). More at pintle. No relation to classical Latin pinna (“fin, flipper, wing-like appendage, wing, feather”), which was extended to mean "ridge, peak, point" (compare pinnacle), and often confused with Latin penna (“wing, feather”). More at feather and pen (Etymology 3).

verb/pɪn/Australia, Canada, Ireland, UK, US[ˈpʰɪn]Australia, Canada, Ireland, UK, US/pən/New-Zealand[ˈpʰən]New-Zealand
  1. To fasten or attach (something) with a pin.

    often
  2. To cause (a piece) to be in a pin.

  3. To pin down (someone).

    He pinned his opponent on the mat.
  4. To enclose; to confine; to pen; to pound.

  5. To attach (an icon, application, message etc.) to another item so that it persists.

    transitive
    to pin a folder to the taskbar
  6. To fix (an array in memory, a security certificate, etc.) so that it cannot be modified.

    transitive
    When marshaling data, the interop marshaler can copy or pin the data being marshaled.
  7. To cause an analog gauge to reach the stop pin at the high end of the range.

    transitive
  8. To inject for performance enhancement.

    ambitransitive · slang
  9. To move a piece onto a blot, preventing the piece from further movement.

Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Proto-Germanic *pinnaz Proto-West Germanic *pinn Old English pinn Middle English pinne English pin From Middle English pinne, from Old English pinn (“pin, peg, bolt”), from Proto-Germanic *pinnaz, *pinnō, *pint- (“protruding point, peak, peg, pin, nail”), from Proto-Indo-European *bend- (“protruding object, pointed peg, nail, edge”). Related to pen (“enclosure”). Cognate with Dutch pin (“peg, pin”), Low German pin, pinne (“pin, point, nail, peg”), German Pinn, Pinne (“pin, tack, peg”), Bavarian Pfonzer, Pfunzer (“sharpened point”), Danish pind (“pin, pointed stick”), Norwegian pinn (“stick”), Swedish pinne (“peg, rod, stick”), Icelandic pinni (“pin”). More at pintle. No relation to classical Latin pinna (“fin, flipper, wing-like appendage, wing, feather”), which was extended to mean "ridge, peak, point" (compare pinnacle), and often confused with Latin penna (“wing, feather”). More at feather and pen (Etymology 3).

noun/pɪn/Australia, Canada, Ireland, UK, US[ˈpʰɪn]Australia, Canada, Ireland, UK, US/pən/New-Zealand[ˈpʰən]New-Zealand
  1. A cataract of the eye.

verb/pɪn/Australia, Canada, Ireland, UK, US[ˈpʰɪn]Australia, Canada, Ireland, UK, US/pən/New-Zealand[ˈpʰən]New-Zealand
  1. Alternative form of peen.

    alt-of · alternative
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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.