alms

UK/ɑːmz//ɑmz/

alms noun: something given to the poor as charity, such as money, clothing or food.

Noun (1)

alms (plural alms)

Something given to the poor as charity, such as money, clothing or food.
- She gave $10 weekly to the poor as alms, in an era when $10 was serious money.
- Alms are distributed from the weekly collection.

Proper noun (1) capitalized: ALMS

ALMS

(abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of American Le Mans Series, an enclosed-wheel enclosed-cockpit four-wheel custom-built prototype sports car racing series.
(abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of Asian Le Mans Series, an enclosed-wheel enclosed-cockpit four-wheel custom-built prototype sports car racing series.

Noun (2) capitalized: ALMs

ALMs

(plural) plural of ALM

Proper noun (2) capitalized: Alms

Alms (plural Almses)

A surname from German.

alms meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu

alms in Hindi

something given to the poor as charity: दान dān, ख़ैरात xairāt, भिक्षा bhikṣā, भीख bhīkh

alms in Tamil

something given to the poor as charity: அளி aḷi

alms in Marathi

something given to the poor as charity: भीक bhīk

alms in Urdu

something given to the poor as charity: صدقہ sadaqa, خیرات xairāt, بِھیک bhīk

More languagesFewer languages

alms in Bengali: ভিক্ষা bhikkha, খয়রাত khoẏorat, সদকা śodoka, ভিখ bhikh
alms in Punjabi: ਭਿੱਖ bhikkha, بھِکّھ bhikkh
alms in Gujarati: ભીખ bhīkh
alms in Sanskrit: भिक्षा bhikṣā, दान dāna
alms in Nepali: दान dān, भिख bhikh
alms in Pashto: صدقه sadaqá, خير xayr
alms in Tagalog: limos
alms in Arabic: صَدَقَة ṣadaqa, خَيْر ḵayr
alms in Malay: sedekah
alms in Indonesian: sedekah, infak, sumbangan
alms in Persian: صدقه sadaqe, تسک task, خیر xeyr
alms in Thai: ทาน taan, ไทยทาน
alms in Vietnamese: của bố thí, chẩn
alms in Myanmar: ဒါန dana.
Dzongkha: སྦྱིན་པ sbyin pa

Forms of alms

Noun
plural	alms
Proper noun
plural	Almses

Plural of alms: alms

Origin of alms

From Middle English almes, almesse, ælmesse, from Old English ælmesse, from Proto-West Germanic *alemōsinā, a borrowing from Vulgar Latin *alemosyna, from Late Latin eleēmosyna, from Ancient Greek ἐλεημοσύνη (eleēmosúnē, “alms”), from ἐλεέω (eleéō, “to have mercy”), from ἔλεος (éleos, “mercy”). Compare Saterland Frisian Aalmoose (“alms”), Dutch aalmoes (“alms”), German Almosen (“alms”), Catalan almoina (“alms”), Portuguese esmola (“alms”), Galician esmola (“alms”), Spanish limosna (“alms”), French aumône (“alms”).

Borrowed from German Alms, but it could also be a variant of Alm.

Words formed from alms

almsdeed
alms-deed
alms-fee
almsfolk
alms-folk
almsful
almsgate
almsgift
almsgiver
almsgiving
almshouse
almsland
almsless
almsman
alms penny
almsroom
alms tub
almswoman
plough-alms
unalmsed

Words that rhyme with alms

Questions about alms

What does alms mean?: Alms means something given to the poor as charity, such as money, clothing or food.
What is alms in Hindi?: Alms in Hindi is दान (dān), ख़ैरात (xairāt), भिक्षा (bhikṣā). See Alms meaning in Hindi.
What part of speech is alms?: Alms can be a noun or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce alms?: Alms is pronounced /ɑːmz/ (UK).
What is the plural of alms?: The plural of alms is alms.

Words near alms in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: alms (page history and authors); ALMS (page history and authors); ALMs (page history and authors); Alms (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated: 2026-09-02

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-alms.ogg.

Cite this entry: “alms.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/alms. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.