Word.ws English Dictionary

flounder

Syllables: floun·der/ˈflæʊ̯ndəː/UK/ˈflaʊ̯ndəː/

flounder noun: a European species of flatfish having dull brown colouring with reddish-brown blotches; fluke, European flounder (Platichthys flesus).

flounder: a European species of flatfish having dull brown colouring with reddish-brown blotches; fluke,...
Image: Tiit Hunt, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

flounder (plural flounder or flounders)

  1. A European species of flatfish having dull brown colouring with reddish-brown blotches; fluke, European flounder (Platichthys flesus).
    • Water Souchy.
      Eels, whitings, soles, flounders, and mackerel are generally used. Stew it in clear fish stock, until done, eight minutes will be enough; add cayenne, catsup, an anchovy, and any other flavouring ingredient; let it boil up, skim, and serve hot altogether in a tureen.1851, Anne Cobbett, The English Housekeeper, Chapter 13
  2. (Canada, US) Any of various flatfish of the family Pleuronectidae or Bothidae.
    • Blackfishing from the beach. I've done my research. Hundreds of shipwrecks line the Jersey coast, and many of them are close enough to reach with a long cast on a dead-low tide. These wrecks hold tautog, porgies, sea bass, flounder.2014, Nick Honachefsky, The Jersey Surf Diaries
  3. A bootmaker's tool for crimping boot fronts.

Verb

flounder (third-person singular simple present flounders, present participle floundering, simple past and past participle floundered)

  1. (intransitive) To act clumsily or confused; to struggle or be flustered.
    • He gave a good speech, but floundered when audience members asked questions he could not answer well.
    • They have floundered on from blunder to blunder.a. 1857, William Hamilton, edited by H[enry] L[ongueville] Mansel and John Veitch, Lectures on Metaphysics and Logic […], volume (please specify |volume=I to IV), Edinburgh; London: William Blackwood...
  2. (intransitive) To flop around as a fish out of water.
  3. (intransitive) To make clumsy attempts to move or regain one's balance.
    • Robert yanked Connie's leg vigorously, causing her to flounder and eventually fall.
  4. To be in serious difficulty.
    • Meanwhile bus and tram competition was causing the Central London Railway to flounder after its early success, and as for the City & South London ... that had always floundered.2012, Andrew Martin, Underground Overground: A passenger's history of the Tube, Profile Books, →ISBN, page 159

flounder meaning in Hindi, Urdu, Malayalam and Kannada

flounder in Hindi

to flounder, struggle, squirm
छटपटाना chaṭpaṭānā

flounder in Urdu

لڑکھڑا کر بولنا, لوٹنا, پھسل جانا

flounder in Malayalam

ഉരുളുക, അബദ്ധം ചെയ്യുക, ചരിയുക, പിടയുക

flounder in Kannada

ಒದ್ದಾಡು, ತಬ್ಬಿಬ್ಬಾಗು, ತಡಬಡಿಸು, ತತ್ತರಪಡು, ತತ್ತಳಗೊಳ್, ತತ್ತಳಗೊಳ್ಳು
More languagesFewer languages
flounder in Tagalog
tatampal

Examples of flounder in a sentence

  • These epics nearly always had runaway trains, nincompoops floundering with the controls and a collapsed bridge just ahead!1958 February, David Gunston, “Railways on the Screen”, in Railway Magazine, page 88:
  • He is assessing directions, but he is not lost, not floundering.1996, Janette Turner Hospital, Oyster, paperback edition, Virago Press, page 136:
  • an assassin who misses his aim and flounders into penitence much as that discomfortable drama misses its point and stumbles into vacuity1886, Algernon Charles Swinburne, The Age of Shakespeare, John Webster:
  • […] I'm floundering at sloppy deliberation in the choice of every new word, and thus damned up in my soul is left to rot.2007, Neal Cassady, “Letter to Allen Ginsberg, May 15, 1951”, in Anne Waldman, editor, The Beat Book: Writings from the Beat Generation:

All 23 example sentences with flounder

Synonyms of flounder

Forms of flounder

Noun
pluralflounder
pluralflounders
Verb
third-person singular presentflounders
present participlefloundering
past participlefloundered
pastfloundered

Plural of flounder: flounder or flounders

Origin of flounder

From Middle English flowndre, from Anglo-Norman floundre, from Old Northern French flondre, from Old Norse flyðra, from Proto-Germanic *flunþrijǭ. Cognate with Danish flynder, German Flunder, Swedish flundra.

Possibly from the noun. Probably a blend of flounce + founder or a blend of founder + blunder or from Dutch flodderen (“wade”). See other terms beginning with fl, such as flutter, flitter, float, flap, flub, flip.

Words formed from flounder

Words that rhyme with flounder

Questions about flounder

What does flounder mean?
Flounder means a European species of flatfish having dull brown colouring with reddish-brown blotches; fluke, European flounder (Platichthys flesus).
What is flounder in Hindi?
Flounder in Hindi is छटपटाना (chaṭpaṭānā). See Flounder meaning in Hindi.
How do you use flounder in a sentence?
These epics nearly always had runaway trains, nincompoops floundering with the controls and a collapsed bridge just ahead!
What part of speech is flounder?
Flounder can be a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce flounder?
Flounder is pronounced /ˈflaʊ̯ndəː/ (UK).
What is the plural of flounder?
The plural of flounder is flounder.

Words near flounder in the dictionary

  1. flounciness
  2. flouncing
  3. flouncingly
  4. flouncings
  5. flouncy
  6. flounder
  7. floundered
  8. flounderer
  9. flounderers
  10. floundering
  11. flounderingly

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: flounder (page history and authors); छटपटाना (Hindi) (page history and authors); flounder (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); flounder (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); flounder (Kannada 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: en-us-flounder.ogg.

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