cable
/ˈkeɪ.bəl/
cable noun: a strong, large-diameter wire or rope, or something resembling such a rope. Also the ellipsis of cable television.
Noun
cable (plural cables)
- A strong, large-diameter wire or rope, or something resembling such a rope.
- An assembly of two or more cable-laid ropes.
- An assembly of two or more wires, used for electrical power or data circuits; one or more and/or the whole may be insulated.
- A strong rope or chain used to moor or anchor a ship.
- “And now the time of tide has come; the ship casts off her cables; and from the deserted wharf the uncheered ship for Tarshish, all careening, glides to sea.1851 November 14, Herman Melville, chapter 9, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC
- A system for transmitting television or Internet services over a network of coaxial or fibreoptic cables.
- I tried to watch the movie last night but my cable was out.
- If the takeover is approved, Comcast would control 20 of the top 25 cable markets, […]. Antitrust officials will need to consider Comcast’s status as a monopsony (a buyer with disproportionate power), when it comes to negotiations with programmers, whose channels it pays to carry.2014 March 15, “Turn it off”, in The Economist, volume 410, number 8878
- A telegram, notably when sent by (submarine) telegraph cable.
- Synonyms:
- cablegram
- A unit of length equal to one tenth of a nautical mile.
- Synonyms:
- cable length
- 100 fathoms, 600 imperial feet, approximately 185 m.
- The currency pair British Pound against United States Dollar.
- A moulding, shaft of a column, or any other member of convex, rounded section, made to resemble the spiral twist of a rope.
- A textural pattern achieved by passing groups of stitches over one another.
Verb
cable (third-person singular simple present cables, present participle cabling, simple past and past participle cabled)
- To provide (something) with cable(s).
- To fasten (something) (as if) with cable(s).
- To wrap (wires) to form a cable.
- To send (a telegram, news, etc.) by cable.
- Details of a bottle fight in El Morocco were cabled all over the world.1946, George Johnston, Skyscrapers in the Mist, page 89
- On 8th November Anthony cabled them, ‘Your great-grandson Randal Lewis Casson arrived to-day. Both well,’ and we sent, ‘Congratulations on becoming great-grandparents.’1972, John Casson, “‘When We Are Old, Are Old’”, in Lewis & Sybil: A Memoir, London: Collins, →ISBN, page 320
- To communicate by cable.
- To ornament (something) with cabling.
- To create cable stitches.
- You've been cabling, twisting, popcorning and bobbling. See, we told you that they weren't so hard.2008, Leisure Arts, I Can't Believe I'm Knitting Cables, page 9
Proper noun capitalized: Cable
Cable (countable and uncountable, plural Cables)
- A surname from Anglo-Norman.
- A census-designated place in Richland Grove Township, Mercer County, Illinois.
- An unincorporated community in Haven Township, Sherburne County, Minnesota.
- An unincorporated community in Wayne Township, Champaign County, Ohio.
- A town and census-designated place therein, in Bayfield County, Wisconsin.
Also used as
cable is also the ellipsis of cable television.
cable meaning in Hindi, Marathi, Urdu and Malayalam
cable in Hindi
- assembly of wires for electricity
- केबल kebal
cable in Marathi
- केबल, केबलिंग, केबलींग
cable in Urdu
- assembly of wires for electricity
- کیبَل kebal
- large wire, rope
- تار tār
cable in Malayalam
- കേബിൾ, ക്യാബിൾ, കേബിളിംഗ്
More languagesFewer languages
- cable in Kannada
- ಕೇಬಲ್, ಕೇಬಲಿಂಗ್
- cable in Gujarati
- કેબલ, કેબલિંગ, કેબલીંગ
- cable in Odia
- କେବୁଲ, କେବଲ୍, କେବୁଲ୍
- cable in Nepali
- केबल
- cable in Tagalog
- kable, sao
- cable in Arabic
- كَابْل kābl
- cable in Malay
- kabel, tali belati
- cable in Indonesian
- kabel, TV kabel
- cable in Persian
- کابل kâbl, کیبل kēbl, kēbal
- cable in Thai
- เคเบิล kee-bə̂n, ลวด lûuat, สายไฟ sǎai-fai, พวน puuan
- cable in Vietnamese
- cáp, truyền hình cáp
- cable in Myanmar
- သံကြိုး samkrui:
Examples of cable in a sentence
- Linear television includes traditional over-the-air broadcasting, as well as much cable and satellite broadcasting.
- If you hook your network cable into the jack, you'll be on the network.
- The trenches for installing the underground cables were dug with a trencher.
Synonyms of cable
Forms of cable
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | cables |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | cables |
| present participle | cabling |
| past participle | cabled |
| past | cabled |
| Proper noun | |
| plural | Cables |
Origin of cable
Recorded since c.1205 as Middle English cable, from Old Northern French cable, from Late Latin capulum (“lasso, rope, halter”), from Latin capiō (“to take, seize”). Use of the term "cable" to refer to the USD/GBP exchange rate originated in the mid-19th century, when the exchange rate began to be transmitted across the Atlantic by a submarine communications cable.
Words formed from cable
- anticable
- array cable
- basic cable
- belted cable
- booster cable
- Bowden cable
- cable-actuated
- cable box
- cable buoy
- cablecar
- cable-car
- cable car
- cablecast
- cable core
- cable drum
- cable ferry
- cablegami
- Cablegate
- cable gland
- cablegram
- cable guy
- cable harness
- cable internet
- cable jack
- cable joint
- cable jointing
- cable knit
- cable-knit
- cable knitting
- cable-lacing
- cable-laid
- cable-laid rope
- cableless
- cablelike
- cable man
- cableman
- cable modem
- cable moulding
- cable needle
- cable puller
- cabler
- cable radio
- cable-ready
- cable release
- cablese
- cable ship
- cable spaghetti
- cable station
- cable-stayed bridge
- cable stitch
- cable stripper
- cable television
- cable terminal
- cable theory
- cable tidy
- cable tie
- cable tramway
- cable tray
- cable TV
- cable up
Phrases with cable
- Y cable
- cable men
- IDE cable
- wye cable
- cable cars
- cable guys
- cable ties
- coax cable
- data cable
- SATA cable
- cable boxes
- cable buoys
40 more phrasesFewer phrases
- cable cores
- cable drums
- cable jacks
- cable ships
- cable trays
- chain cable
- power cable
- cable glands
- cable joints
- cable lacing
- cable length
- cable modems
- Cable Street
- jumper cable
- kettle cable
- ribbon cable
- stream cable
- cable ferries
- cable lengths
- cable pullers
- coaxial cable
- octopus cable
- starter cable
- suicide cable
- cable releases
- cable stations
- cable tramways
- rollover cable
- screened cable
- sheathed cable
- shielded cable
- slip the cable
- wireless cable
- cable harnesses
- cable mouldings
- cable strippers
- cable terminals
- crossover cable
- extension cable
- male-to-male cable
Words that rhyme with cable
16 more rhymesFewer rhymes
Questions about cable
- What does cable mean?
- Cable means a strong, large-diameter wire or rope, or something resembling such a rope.
- What is cable in Hindi?
- Cable in Hindi is केबल (kebal). See Cable meaning in Hindi.
- What part of speech is cable?
- Cable can be a noun, a verb or a proper noun.
- How do you pronounce cable?
- Cable is pronounced /ˈkeɪ.bəl/.
- What is the plural of cable?
- The plural of cable is cables.
Words near cable in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: cable (page history and authors); Cable (page history and authors); cable (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); cable (Malayalam, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); cable (Kannada, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); cable (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); cable (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); cable (Nepali, 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: en-us-cable.ogg.
Cite this entry: “cable.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/cable. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.