Word.ws English Dictionary

formic acid

formic acid noun: the simplest carboxylic acid, HCOOH, a colourless, corrosive liquid with a sharp odour systematically known as methanoic acid; it is present in the stings of ants, bees and nettles, and is prepared industrially by the oxidation of methanol or formaldehyde; it has some industrial uses, and its esters, the formates are used in perfumes.

Noun

formic acid (uncountable)

  1. The simplest carboxylic acid, HCOOH, a colourless, corrosive liquid with a sharp odour systematically known as methanoic acid; it is present in the stings of ants, bees and nettles, and is prepared industrially by the oxidation of methanol or formaldehyde; it has some industrial uses, and its esters, the formates are used in perfumes.
    • The ant has made himself illustrious / Through constant industry industrious. / So what? / Would you be calm and placid / If you were full of formic acid?1941, Ogden Nash, “The Ant”, in The Face is Familiar: The Selected Verse of Ogden Nash, reprint edition, Garden City, N.Y.: Garden City Publishing Company, →OCLC, page 224
    Synonyms:
    E236, methanoic acid

formic acid meaning in Tamil, Gujarati, Arabic and Persian

formic acid in Tamil

போமிக்கமிலம், ஃபார்மிக் அமிலம்

formic acid in Gujarati

methanoic acid
પિપીલિકામ્લ pipīlikāmla

formic acid in Arabic

methanoic acid
حمض الفورميك

formic acid in Persian

methanoic acid
فرمیک اسید formik asid, جوهر مورچه jowhar-e murče
More languagesFewer languages
formic acid in Thai
กรดฟอร์มิก, กรดมด

Synonyms of formic acid

Words formed from formic acid

Questions about formic acid

What does formic acid mean?
Formic acid means the simplest carboxylic acid, HCOOH, a colourless, corrosive liquid with a sharp odour systematically known as methanoic acid; it is present in the stings of ants, bees and nettles, and is prepared industrially by the oxidation of methanol or formaldehyde; it has some industrial uses, and its esters, the formates are used in perfumes.
What is formic acid in Tamil?
Formic acid in Tamil is போமிக்கமிலம், ஃபார்மிக் அமிலம். See Formic acid meaning in Tamil.
What part of speech is formic acid?
Formic acid is a noun.

Words near formic acid in the dictionary

  1. formful
  2. formfulness
  3. formfuls
  4. Formia
  5. formic
  6. formic acid
  7. formica
  8. formicaite
  9. formican
  10. formicant
  11. formicaria

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: formic acid (page history and authors); formic acid (Tamil 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)-Flame, not lame-formic acid.wav, LL-Q1860 (eng)-Tesco250-formic acid.wav.

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