overwordExplorer
ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

teal.

Any of various small freshwater ducks of the genus Anas that are brightly coloured and have short necks.

4 characters1 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/tiːl/Received-Pronunciation[tiːɫ]Received-Pronunciation/til/General-American
  1. Any of various small freshwater ducks of the genus Anas that are brightly coloured and have short necks.

    countable
  2. A dark, somewhat bluish-green colour; a dark cyan.

    countable · uncountable
  3. A teal independent.

    Australia · attributive · countable
Where this word comes from

From Middle English tele, probably from an unrecorded Old English *tǣle, cognate with West Frisian tjilling (“teal”), Middle Dutch teling (“teal”) (modern Dutch taling), Middle Low German telink, from Proto-Germanic *tailijaz, of unknown ultimate origin, with no cognates outside of Germanic. Compare feal and heal for similar phonological development. As the name of a shade of dark greenish-blue like the color patterns on the fowl's head and wings, it is attested from 1923. The Australian political sense derives from the colour teal being intermediate between green (signifying environmentalism) and blue (signifying the conservative Australian Liberal Party).

adj/tiːl/Received-Pronunciation[tiːɫ]Received-Pronunciation/til/General-American
  1. Having a bluish-green colour.

Where this word comes from

From Middle English tele, probably from an unrecorded Old English *tǣle, cognate with West Frisian tjilling (“teal”), Middle Dutch teling (“teal”) (modern Dutch taling), Middle Low German telink, from Proto-Germanic *tailijaz, of unknown ultimate origin, with no cognates outside of Germanic. Compare feal and heal for similar phonological development. As the name of a shade of dark greenish-blue like the color patterns on the fowl's head and wings, it is attested from 1923. The Australian political sense derives from the colour teal being intermediate between green (signifying environmentalism) and blue (signifying the conservative Australian Liberal Party).

FROM WORD TO NAME

Try it on your idea.

teal has 4 characters. Say it out loud, try it alongside a description of your project, and see whether its meaning fits what you want to create.

teal studioteal workshello, teal

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.