Word.ws English Dictionary

boss

/bɒs/

More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations

Australia/bɔs/

boss noun: one who oversees and directs the work of others; a supervisor.

Noun (1)

boss (plural bosses)

  1. One who oversees and directs the work of others; a supervisor.
    • The boss of the company was going to Spain for work.
    • Rule Number Two: Always treat the boss as if he's blind and stupid.2000 February 5, Douglas Watkinson et al., “Beyond the Grave”, in Midsomer Murders
    Synonyms:
    manager, supervisor
  2. A person in charge of a business or company.
    • Chat turned to whisper when the boss entered the conference room.
    • My boss complains that I'm always late to work.
    Synonyms:
    employer
  3. A leader, the head of an organized group or team.
    • They named him boss because he had good leadership skills.
    Synonyms:
    head, leader
  4. The head of a political party in a given region or district.
    • He is the Republican boss in Kentucky.
    Synonyms:
    leader
  5. (Australia) The male owner or man in charge of a large rural property.
    • Above all, she must not tell the boss of any little irregularity she may see.1937, Ion L. Idriess, Over the Range, Sydney: Angus and Robertson, published 1947, page 5
  6. (humorous) One's wife.
    • There's no olive oil; will sunflower oil do? — I'll have to run that by the boss.
  7. (India, Multicultural-London-English, Philippines, especially, informal) A term of address to a man, especially a customer; sometimes also to a friend or acquaintance of equal standing.
    • Good to see you, boss.
  8. An enemy, often at the end of a level, that is particularly challenging and must be beaten in order to progress.
    • Cuphead built a reputation for difficulty before release, but its boss battles are mostly about recognizing patterns than getting lucky against unfair bosses. Watching players ace their way through the game’s bosses is a spellbinding reminder that even tough games can be defeated easily with hard...2017 October 2, Heather Alexandra, “Cuphead Player Beats Bosses Without Taking A Single Hit”, in Kotaku, archived from the original on 18 Feb 2018
    Synonyms:
    guardian

Verb (1)

boss (third-person singular simple present bosses, present participle bossing, simple past and past participle bossed)

  1. (transitive) To exercise authoritative control over; to tell (someone) what to do, often repeatedly.
    • By YOU last night’s journey was actually bossed / Without you, I’m certain, we’d all have been lost.1931, Robert L. May, Rudolph, The Red-Nosed Reindeer, Montgomery Ward (publisher)
    • His sisters bossed him and spoiled him. All their lives he was to go on being their little brother, who could do no wrong, because he was the baby; [...]1932, Lorine Pruette, The Parent and the Happy Child, page 76

Adjective

boss (comparative bosser, superlative bossest)

  1. (Canada, US, slang, Liverpool) Of excellent quality, first-rate.
    • That is a boss Zefron poster.
    • Boy 2: He's the neatest looking guy on TV!
      Boy 3: I'll say!
      Boy 1: He sure is!
      Boy 3: Boy, the way he talks is really boss!1966 February 17, Dennis Whitcomb, “Zombo” (7:35 from the start), in The Munsters, season 2, episode 22

Noun (2)

boss (plural bosses)

  1. A lump-like mass of rock, especially one projecting through a stratum of different rock.
  2. A convex protuberance in hammered work, especially the rounded projection in the centre of a shield.
  3. A protrusion; frequently a cylinder of material that extends beyond a hole.
    • To the upper part of the frame a chain is attached, and if the screw shaft be drawn back out of the boss, the square frame may be hove up by carrying the chain to a winch—the sliding block maintaining the frame in the perpendicular position.1846, editorial staff, “Maudslay's Improvements in propelling Machinery”, in Scientific American (1), volume 2, number 13, page 100
    • The seargent […] screwing a bipod into the threaded boss on the underside of the barrel would kill these animals […]1985, Cormac McCarthy, chapter IV, in Blood Meridian […] , →OCLC
  4. A knob or projection, usually at the intersection of ribs in a vault.
  5. A roughly cut stone set in place for later carving.
  6. A target block, made of foam but historically made of hay bales, to which a target face is attached.
  7. A wooden vessel for the mortar used in tiling or masonry, hung by a hook from the laths, or from the rounds of a ladder.
    • Boss, a short trough for holding water, when tiling the roof1842, Peter Nicholson, The Mechanic's Companion
  8. A head or reservoir of water.

Verb (2)

boss (third-person singular simple present bosses, present participle bossing, simple past and past participle bossed)

  1. (transitive) To decorate with bosses; to emboss.

Noun (3)

boss (plural bosses)

  1. (obsolete) A hassock or small seat, especially made from a bundle of straw.
    • All were waiting : uncle Charles, who sat far away in the shadow of the window, Dante and Mr Casey, who sat in the easy chairs at either side of the hearth, Stephen, seated on a chair between them, his feet resting on a toasting boss.1916, James Joyce, Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man, Macmillan Press Ltd, paperback, section 36
    Synonyms:
    footrest, hassock

Proper noun (1) capitalized: BOSS

BOSS

  1. (US, abbreviation, acronym) Acronym of Bond and Option Sales Strategy.

Proper noun (2) capitalized: Boss

Boss

  1. A surname.

boss meaning in Hindi, Urdu, Kannada and Punjabi

boss in Hindi

supervisor
मालिक mālik
person in charge
मालिक mālik

boss in Urdu

supervisor
مالِک mālik
person in charge
مالِک mālik

boss in Kannada

ಬಾಸ್

boss in Punjabi

ਬੌਸ
More languagesFewer languages
boss in Gujarati
બોસ, બોસને
boss in Arabic
رَئِيس raʔīs, رَئِيسَة raʔīsa, مُدِير mudīr, مُدِيرَة mudīra
boss in Malay
bos
boss in Indonesian
bos
boss in Thai
นายงาน naai-ngaan, นายจ้าง naai-jâang, นาย naai, หัวหน้า hǔua-nâa
boss in Vietnamese
ông chủ, thủ trưởng, sếp, trùm

Examples of boss in a sentence

  • We have some vindictive people as bosses, and you don’t want to be the target of their wrath.2018 February 18, Dawn Pine, “Strategies for Dealing with a Bad Boss”, in (Please provide the book title or journal name), archived from...
  • Cuphead built a reputation for difficulty before release, but its boss battles are mostly about recognizing patterns than getting lucky against unfair bosses.2017 October 2, Heather Alexandra, “Cuphead Player Beats Bosses Without Taking A Single Hit”, in Kotaku, archived from the original on 18...
  • She bossed him, and he's never gotten over it.1967, Pelham Grenville Wodehouse, The purloined paperweight, page 90:
  • For if, on the one hand, I bossed him and showed him what to do and how to do it, [...]1980, Jean Toomer, The wayward and the seeking: a collection of writings by Jean Toomer, page 40:

All 40 example sentences with boss

Synonyms of boss

15 more synonymsFewer synonyms

Antonyms

All synonyms and antonyms of boss

Forms of boss

Noun
pluralbosses
Verb
third-person singular presentbosses
present participlebossing
past participlebossed
pastbossed
Adjective
comparativebosser
superlativebossest

Plural of boss: bosses

Origin of boss

Borrowed from Dutch baas, from Middle Dutch baes (“master of a household, friend”), from Old Dutch *baso (“uncle, kinsman”), from Proto-West Germanic *baswō, from Proto-Germanic *baswô (“uncle”), perhaps from Proto-Germanic *ba-, *bō- (“father, older male relative”), source also of the English terms babe, boy, bub, bully. Cognate with Middle Low German bās (“supervisor, foreman”), Old Frisian bas (“master”), hence Saterland Frisian Boas (“boss”), Old High German basa (“father's sister, cousin”), hence German Base (“aunt, cousin”). Originally a term of respect used to address an older relative. Later, in New Amsterdam, it began to mean a person in charge who is not a master. The video game sense is borrowed from Japanese ボス (bosu), borrowed from English boss.

From Middle English bos, bose, boce, from Old French boce (“lump, bulge, protuberance, knot”), from Frankish *bottja, from Proto-Germanic *bautaną (“to hit, strike, beat”). Doublet of beat; see there for more.

Apparently a corruption of bast.

Words formed from boss

Phrases with boss

9 more phrasesFewer phrases

Words that rhyme with boss

27 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about boss

What does boss mean?
Boss means one who oversees and directs the work of others; a supervisor.
What is boss in Hindi?
Boss in Hindi is मालिक (mālik). See Boss meaning in Hindi.
How do you use boss in a sentence?
We have some vindictive people as bosses, and you don’t want to be the target of their wrath.
What part of speech is boss?
Boss can be a noun, a verb, an adjective or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce boss?
Boss is pronounced /bɒs/ (UK).
What is the plural of boss?
The plural of boss is bosses.

Words near boss in the dictionary

  1. bosquet
  2. bosquets
  3. Bosquez
  4. Bosquezes
  5. Bosra
  6. boss
  7. boss about
  8. boss around
  9. boss bitch
  10. boss bitches
  11. boss boy

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: boss (page history and authors); BOSS (page history and authors); Boss (page history and authors); boss (Kannada, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); boss (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); boss (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). 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:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-boss.wav, en-us-boss.ogg.

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