Word.ws English Dictionary

core

UK/kɔː//kɔɹ/

core noun: the central part of a fruit, containing the kernels or seeds. Also the ellipsis of core memory.

Noun (1)

core (countable and uncountable, plural cores)

  1. The central part of a fruit, containing the kernels or seeds.
    • the core of an apple or quince
  2. The heart or inner part of a physical thing.
    • Reindeer are well suited to the taiga’s frigid winters. They can maintain a thermogradient between body core and the environment of up to 100 degrees, in part because of insulation provided by their fur, and in part because of counter-current vascular heat exchange systems in their legs and nasal...2013 March, Nancy Langston, “Mining the Boreal North”, in American Scientist, volume 101, number 2, page 98
  3. The anatomical core, muscles which bridge abdomen and thorax.
  4. The center or inner part of a space or area.
    • the core of the square1614, Walter Ralegh [i.e., Walter Raleigh], The Historie of the World […], London: […] William Stansby for Walter Burre, […], →OCLC, (please specify |book=1 to 5)
  5. The most important part of a thing or aggregate of things wherever located and whether of any determinate location at all; the essence.
    • the core of a subject
    • Jones’ sad eyes betray a pervasive pain his purposefully spare dialogue only hints at, while the perfectly cast Brolin conveys hints of playfulness and warmth while staying true to the craggy stoicism at the character’s core.2012 May 24, Nathan Rabin, “Film: Reviews: Men In Black 3”, in The Onion AV Club
    1. The main and most diverse monophyletic group within a clade or taxonomic group.
    2. The set of feasible allocations that cannot be improved upon by a subset (a coalition) of the economy's agents.
    3. A thematic aesthetic; objects related to a specific topic
      • Photographs of cottagecore focuses on countrysides or forests.
  6. The portion of a mold that creates a cavity or impression within the part (casting or molded part) or that makes a hole in or through the part.
  7. An individual computer processor, in the sense when several processors (called cores or CPU cores) are plugged together in one single integrated circuit to work as one (called a multi-core processor).
    • I wanted to play a particular computer game, which required I buy a new computer, so while the game said it needed at least a dual-core processor, I wanted my computer to be a bit ahead of the curve, so I bought a quad-core.
  8. The material between surface materials in a structured composite sandwich material.
    • a floor panel with a Nomex honeycomb core
  9. (nuclear physics) The inner part of a nuclear reactor, in which the nuclear reaction takes place.
    • In the engine room, the changing angle dropped the melted core to the deck. The hot mass attacked the steel deck first, burning through that, then the titanium of the hull. Five seconds later the engine room was vented to the sea.1984, Tom Clancy, “The Eighth Day: Friday, 10 December”, in The Hunt for Red October, Annapolis, Maryland: Naval Institute Press, →ISBN, pages 194–195
  10. The central fissile portion of a fission weapon.
    • In a hollow-core design, neutrons escape from the core more readily, allowing more fissile material to be used (and thus allowing for a greater yield) while still keeping the core subcritical prior to detonation.
  11. A piece of ferromagnetic material (e.g., soft iron), inside the windings of an electromagnet, that channels the magnetic field.
  12. A hollow cylindrical piece of cardboard around which a web of paper or plastic is wound.
Show 6 more meaningsShow fewer meanings
  1. A tiny sample of organic material obtained by means of a fine-needle biopsy.
  2. The bony process which forms the central axis of the horns in many animals.
  3. A disorder of sheep caused by worms in the liver.
    • [the skin of the sheep] is clear from cores and jogs under the jaws.1750, William Ellis, Modern Husbandry or Practice of Farming
  4. The central part of a protein's structure, consisting mostly of hydrophobic amino acids.
  5. A cylindrical sample of rock or other materials obtained by core drilling.
  6. An atomic nucleus plus inner electrons (i.e., an atom, except for its valence electrons).

Adjective

core (not comparable)

  1. Forming the most important or essential part.
    • Privately held businesses may hold assets or have charges to their financial statements which are not core to their main business activity.2009, Greg Hayes, A Practical Guide to Business Valuations for SMEs, page 68
    • Private-equity nabobs bristle at being dubbed mere financiers. Piling debt onto companies’ balance-sheets is only a small part of what leveraged buy-outs are about, they insist. Improving the workings of the businesses they take over is just as core to their calling, if not more so. Much of their...2013 June 22, “Engineers of a different kind”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8841, page 70
  2. (board sports) Deeply and authentically involved in the culture surrounding the sport.
    • Our interest is not in core skaters such as young males and pro skaters but the voices of those on the periphery of the subculture.2015, Kara-Jane Lombard, Skateboarding: Subcultures, Sites and Shifts, page 45
    • We had a segmentation strategy, where the small, independent core skate shops — the three hundred boutiques around the country who really created us — had a certain product line that was exclusive to them. […] We said to the core shops, you don't have to compete with the malls.2022, Malcolm Gladwell, The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference

Verb

core (third-person singular simple present cores, present participle coring, simple past and past participle cored)

  1. To remove the core of an apple or other fruit.
  2. To cut or drill through the core of (something).
    • But the other thing to take into account is, when you look at the Katahdin and the Polyphemus, they both have their boiler plants pretty much amidships or slightly forward of amidships, which means that, in the event of a heat-lance strike on the boiler room, not only is that gonna core through the...2020 April 1, Drachinifel, 6:52 from the start, in HMS Thunderchild - A bad day to be a Tripod, archived from the original on 24 Sep 2022
  3. To extract a sample with a drill.

Noun (2)

core (plural cores)

  1. (obsolete) A body of individuals; an assemblage.
    • He was in a core of people.1622, Francis, Lord Verulam, Viscount St. Alban [i.e. Francis Bacon], The Historie of the Raigne of King Henry the Seventh, […], London: […] W[illiam] Stansby for Matthew Lownes, and William Barret...

Noun (3)

core (plural cores)

  1. A miner's underground working time or shift.

Noun (4)

core (plural cores)

  1. (machinery, marine) A deposit paid by the purchaser of a rebuilt part, to be refunded on return of a used, rebuildable part, or the returned rebuildable part itself.

Noun (5)

core (plural cores)

  1. (neologism) An aesthetic ending in the suffix -core, such as cottagecore, normcore, etc.
    • Some of the most popular "cores" at the moment—according to the Wiki's "trending pages" list—are cottage and goblin and trauma and angel. If the last one sounds appealing, you can participate by eating more meringues and buying a pet dove.2021 February 5, Kaitlyn Tiffany, “Cottagecore Was Just the Beginning”, in Jeffrey Goldberg, editor, The Atlantic, Washington, D.C.: The Atlantic Monthly Group, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the...
    • The rise of micro-cores coincides with the rise of hyper-specific internet aesthetics. There's even an Aesthetics Wiki that chronicles all the possible cores online, including, but not limited to, bubblegumbitchcore, cottagecore, and fairycore.2022 July 27, Sarah Spellings, “Core Is the New Chic”, in Vogue, New York, N.Y.: Condé Nast Publications, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 15 May 2023

Noun (6) capitalized: CORE

CORE

  1. (abbreviation, acronym) Acronym of corporate responsibility.

Proper noun (1) capitalized: CORE

CORE

  1. (US, abbreviation, acronym) Acronym of Congress of Racial Equality.
    • “I start heading back up to 125th and people are all buzzing, saying the police have beat up and arrested some CORE people.”2021, Colson Whitehead, Harlem Shuffle, Fleet, page 220
  2. (abbreviation, acronym) Acronym of Center for Operations Research and Econometrics
  3. (abbreviation, acronym) Acronym of Consortium for Oceanographic Research and Education.
  4. (abbreviation, acronym) Acronym of Council on Rehabilitation Education.
  5. (abbreviation, acronym) Acronym of Computing Research and Education Association.

Proper noun (2) capitalized: Core

Core

  1. (Greek) The birth name of Persephone/Proserpina, the queen of the Underworld/Hades, and goddess of the seasons and of vegetation. She is the daughter of Zeus and Demeter, and the wife of Hades.
  2. A female given name from Ancient Greek.
  3. A surname.
  4. A neighbourhood of San Diego, California, United States.
  5. An unincorporated community in Monongalia County, West Virginia, United States.

Proper noun (3) capitalized: Core

Core

  1. (obsolete) Obsolete form of Korah.

Also used as

core is also the ellipsis of core memory.

core is also the alternative form of cor.

core meaning in Hindi, Urdu, Bengali and Telugu

core in Hindi

central part of fruit, containing the kernels or seeds
गूदा gūdā

core in Urdu

کور

core in Bengali

কোর

core in Telugu

కోర్
More languagesFewer languages
core in Kannada
ಕೋರ್
core in Gujarati
કોર
core in Odia
କୋର
core in Nepali
कोर, कोअर
core in Tagalog
ubod
core in Arabic
نِوَاة niwāh
core in Indonesian
inti
core in Persian
هسته haste, مغزه maġze
core in Vietnamese
lõi, tâm

Examples of core in a sentence

  • General vocabulary is often defined as a common core of English words and operationalized as the most frequent words in a balanced and representative corpus of English.2018, Clarence Green, James Lambert, “Advancing disciplinary literacy through English for academic purposes: Discipline-specific wordlists...
  • Improving the workings of the businesses they take over is just as core to their calling, if not more so.2013 June 22, “Engineers of a different kind”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8841, page 70:
  • […] which provoked resistance among the 'core' snowboarders.2023, Mari Kristin Sisjord, Women in Snowboarding:
  • Naming it as a "core" turns the clothing into a social media movement, and more often than not, the title is an overcomplication for rather basic color choices or fabric selections.2022 December 23, Dylan Kelly, “Can 2023 Be the Year of "Nothingcore"?”, in Hypebeast, archived from the original on 01 Jun 2023:

All 40 example sentences with core

Synonyms of core

Forms of core

Noun
pluralcores
Verb
third-person singular presentcores
present participlecoring
past participlecored
pastcored
Proper noun
alternative formKore

Plural of core: cores

Origin of core

From Middle English core, kore, coor (“apple-core, pith”), of obscure and uncertain origin. Possibly of native English origin, from Old English *cor, related to Old English *coruc, *corc (diminutive) (> Middle English cork, crok (“core of an apple or other fruit, heart of an onion”)) and Old English corn (“seed", also "grain”); or alternatively perhaps from Old French cuer (“heart”), from Latin cor (“heart”); or from Old French cors (“body”), from Latin corpus (“body”). Compare also Middle English colk, coke, coll (“the heart or centre of an apple or onion, core”), Dutch kern (“core”), German Kern (“core”). See also heart, corpse. Compare typologically Russian серде́чник (serdéčnik), сердцеви́на (serdcevína)) (akin to се́рдце (sérdce), cognate with heart, Latin cor).

See corps.

See chore.

Words formed from core

Phrases with core

39 more phrasesFewer phrases

Words that rhyme with core

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about core

What does core mean?
Core means the central part of a fruit, containing the kernels or seeds.
What is core in Hindi?
Core in Hindi is गूदा (gūdā). See Core meaning in Hindi.
How do you use core in a sentence?
General vocabulary is often defined as a common core of English words and operationalized as the most frequent words in a balanced and representative corpus of English.
What part of speech is core?
Core can be a noun, an adjective, a verb or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce core?
Core is pronounced /kɔː/ (UK).
What is the plural of core?
The plural of core is cores.

Words near core in the dictionary

  1. cordylids
  2. cordyline
  3. cordylines
  4. Cordys
  5. Cordăreni
  6. core
  7. core belief
  8. core beliefs
  9. core business
  10. core cities
  11. core city

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: core (page history and authors); CORE (page history and authors); Core (page history and authors); core (Urdu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); core (Bengali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); core (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); core (Kannada, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); core (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); core (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); core (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.

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

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