Word.ws English Dictionary

cam

/ˈkæm/US/ˈkeə̯m/

cam noun: a turning or sliding piece which imparts motion to a rod, lever or block brought into sliding or rolling contact with it. Also the alternative form of kam.

cam: a turning or sliding piece which imparts motion to a rod, lever or block brought into sliding or...
Image: Borowski, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun (1)

cam (plural cams)

  1. A turning or sliding piece which imparts motion to a rod, lever or block brought into sliding or rolling contact with it.
    1. A curved wedge, movable about an axis, used for forcing or clamping two pieces together.
  2. (UK, dialectal) A ridge or mound of earth.
    • Cum doun t' cam' soid1861, Dean Ramsay, Reminiscences of Scottish Life and Character
  3. A spring-loaded camming device, a spring-loaded device for effecting a temporary belay in a rock crevice.

Noun (2)

cam (plural cams)

  1. (informal) Camera.
  2. (piracy) A bootleg recording of a film recorded in a movie theater.

Verb

cam (third-person singular simple present cams, present participle camming, simple past and past participle cammed)

  1. To go on webcam.

Noun (3) capitalized: CAM

CAM (plural CAMs)

  1. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of complementary and alternative medicine.
  2. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of common area maintenance.
  3. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of computer-aided manufacturing.
  4. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of cockpit area microphone.
  5. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of cell-adhesion molecule.
  6. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of crassulacean acid metabolism.
  7. (US, abbreviation, historical, initialism) Initialism of contract air mail (often followed by the route number, eg, CAM 21).
  8. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of content-addressable memory.

Proper noun (1) capitalized: CAM

CAM

  1. (abbreviation) Abbreviation of Campeche: a state of Mexico.

Proper noun (2) capitalized: Cam

Cam

  1. A river in Cambridgeshire, England, which passes through Cambridge and joins the Great Ouse.
    Synonyms:
    Granta

Proper noun (3) capitalized: Cam

Cam

  1. A village and civil parish in Stroud district, Gloucestershire, England (OS grid ref SO7400).
  2. A minor river in Gloucestershire which flows into the Gloucester and Sharpness Canal.

Proper noun (4) capitalized: Cam

US/kæm/

Cam (plural Cams)

  1. A diminutive of the male given name Cameron.
    • Cam Smith bounced to shortstop on a 100 mph fastball, and Jacob Melton also grounded out on an 86.9 mph curveball.2025 June 11, “White Sox pitching prospect Grant Taylor makes jump from Double-A to perfect major league debut”, in Associated Press, archived from the original on 12 Jun 2025

Also used as

cam is also the alternative form of kam.

cam meaning in Hindi, Marathi, Urdu and Bengali

cam in Hindi

कैम, कैम करना

cam in Marathi

कॅम

cam in Urdu

کیم

cam in Bengali

ক্যাম, ক্যামে
More languagesFewer languages
cam in Telugu
కామ్
cam in Malayalam
കാമ്, കാം, കാമ് ചെയ്യാൻ
cam in Kannada
ಕ್ಯಾಮ್
cam in Punjabi
ਕੈਮ
cam in Odia
କ୍ଯ଼ାମ୍
cam in Nepali
क्याम

Examples of cam in a sentence

  • Whin shü cam oot an fann me dere Wi peenie fairlins eltit.
  • The racecar's cammed out engine raspily loped and sputtered as it waited for the green light.
  • This engine is an overhead cam model.

All 20 example sentences with cam

Synonyms of cam

Forms of cam

Noun
pluralcams
pluralCAMs
Verb
third-person singular presentcams
present participlecamming
past participlecammed
pastcammed
Adverb
comparativemore cam
superlativemost cam
Proper noun
pluralCams

Plural of cam: cams

Origin of cam

PIE word *ǵómbʰos Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *ǵembʰ- Proto-Indo-European *-os Proto-Indo-European *ǵómbʰos Proto-Germanic *kambaz Proto-West Germanic ᚲᚨᛒᚨ Proto-West Germanic *kamb Old Dutch *kamb Middle Dutch kamp Dutch kamder. English cam Recorded since the 16th century, from Dutch kam (“cog of a wheel; originally, comb”) (cognate with English comb, and preserved in modern Dutch compounds such as kamrad, kamwiel (“cog wheel”)). Doublet of comb.

Clipping of camera.

A back-formation from Cambridge; compare Middle English Cante and New Latin Camus, Chamus.

Words formed from cam

Phrases with cam

7 more phrasesFewer phrases

Words that rhyme with cam

47 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about cam

What does cam mean?
Cam means a turning or sliding piece which imparts motion to a rod, lever or block brought into sliding or rolling contact with it.
What is cam in Hindi?
Cam in Hindi is कैम, कैम करना. See Cam meaning in Hindi.
What part of speech is cam?
Cam can be a noun, a verb or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce cam?
Cam is pronounced /ˈkæm/.
What is the plural of cam?
The plural of cam is cams.

Words near cam in the dictionary

  1. calzoni
  2. calzoons
  3. calèche
  4. calèches
  5. Caló
  6. cam
  7. cam band
  8. cam belt
  9. cam belts
  10. cam boy
  11. cam boys

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: cam (page history and authors); CAM (page history and authors); Cam (page history and authors); cam (Hindi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); cam (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); cam (Urdu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); cam (Bengali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); cam (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); cam (Malayalam, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); cam (Kannada, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); cam (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); cam (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); cam (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: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-cam.wav.

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