Word.ws English Dictionary

cuticle

/ˈkjuːtɪkəl/

cuticle noun: the strip of hardened skin at the base and sides of a fingernail or toenail.

cuticle: a woman's hand with a manicured manicure
Photo by 한별 정 on Unsplash

Noun

cuticle (plural cuticles)

  1. The strip of hardened skin at the base and sides of a fingernail or toenail.
    • By that time she has pushed back his cuticles, cleaned his nails and painted them with clear polish.1992, Toni Morrison, Jazz, Vintage (2016), page 38
  2. Dead or cornified epidermis.
    Synonyms:
    epidermis
  3. A noncellular protective covering outside the epidermis of many invertebrates.
    • Holonym: exoskeleton
  4. A noncellular protective covering outside the epidermis of many plants.
  5. A thin skin formed on the surface of a liquid.
  6. A protective layer on the shell of a bird's egg.

cuticle meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Bengali and Arabic

cuticle in Tamil

புறத்தோல், தாலின் மற் கடினப்பகுதி, மலுறை, சிறுசருமம், தடித்ததோல், மேல்உறை

cuticle in Urdu

جلد

cuticle in Bengali

নখের গোড়ার চামড়া, কিউটিকল

cuticle in Arabic

strip of hardened skin at the base of the finger and toenail
بُشَيْرَة bušayra
More languagesFewer languages
cuticle in Malay
kutikel
cuticle in Indonesian
kutikula

Examples of cuticle in a sentence

  • Poikilohydry occurs in such organisms as lichens and bryophytes, which lack mechanisms such as waterproofing cuticles or stomata that can help resist desiccation.
  • Don’t skimp when it comes to the nail clippers and cuticle pusher.
  • Once he was balanced, his cuticles became the focus of his attention.

All 11 example sentences with cuticle

Synonyms of cuticle

Forms of cuticle

pluralcuticles

Plural of cuticle: cuticles

Origin of cuticle

Learned borrowing from Latin cutīcula (“cuticle, skin”). Doublet of cuticula.

Words formed from cuticle

Words that rhyme with cuticle

7 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about cuticle

What does cuticle mean?
Cuticle means the strip of hardened skin at the base and sides of a fingernail or toenail.
What is cuticle in Tamil?
Cuticle in Tamil is புறத்தோல், தாலின் மற் கடினப்பகுதி, மலுறை. See Cuticle meaning in Tamil.
What part of speech is cuticle?
Cuticle is a noun.
How do you pronounce cuticle?
Cuticle is pronounced /ˈkjuːtɪkəl/.
What is the plural of cuticle?
The plural of cuticle is cuticles.

Words near cuticle in the dictionary

  1. Cuthrell
  2. Cuthrells
  3. cUTI
  4. cutia
  5. cutias
  6. cuticle
  7. cuticle pusher
  8. cuticleless
  9. cuticles
  10. cuticlin
  11. cuticlins

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: cuticle (page history and authors); cuticle (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); cuticle (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); cuticle (Bengali Wiktionary) (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:

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

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