overwordExplorer
ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

possum.

A marsupial of several families of the order Diprotodontia, found in Australia and neighboring islands.

6 characters2 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/ˈpɒsəm/
  1. A marsupial of several families of the order Diprotodontia, found in Australia and neighboring islands.

  2. An opossum, a marsupial of the family Didelphidae of the Americas.

    US
Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Proto-Algonquian *wa·p- Proto-Algonquian *aθemwa Proto-Algonquian *wa·p-aʔθemwa Powhatan aposoumbor. English opossumder. English possum Derived from opossum by apheresis.

verb/ˈpɒsəm/
  1. To play possum; to feign sleep, illness, or death.

    intransitive
Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Proto-Algonquian *wa·p- Proto-Algonquian *aθemwa Proto-Algonquian *wa·p-aʔθemwa Powhatan aposoumbor. English opossumder. English possum Derived from opossum by apheresis.

FROM WORD TO NAME

Try it on your idea.

possum has 6 characters. Say it out loud, try it alongside a description of your project, and see whether its meaning fits what you want to create.

possum studiopossum workshello, possum

These are naming prompts. Meanings and pronunciation can vary; existing brand and domain uses have not been checked.

Explore the name generator

A 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.