girl

/ˈɡɜːl//ˈɡɜɹl/

girl noun: a female child.

Noun

girl (countable and uncountable, plural girls)

A female child.
- I saw a little girl feeding, brushing, and talking to a heifer.
(offensive, sometimes, see usage note) A woman, especially a young and often attractive woman.
- He has a crush on a girl at work. We were kidding with him yesterday about his work crush.
(colloquial) A term of address to a female (see usage notes)
- Hey, girl, I haven't seen you since last week! Where you been?
- "My dear girl, what has he done?" said Mrs. Mallowe, sweetly. It is noticeable that ladies of a certain age call each other "dear girl," just as commissioners of twenty-eight years' standing address their equals in the Civil List as "my boy."1889, Rudyard Kipling, “The Education of Otis Yeere”, in Under the Deodars, Boston: The Greenock Press, published 1899, page 10
Synonyms:

girlie, lass, lassie
(colloquial) One's girlfriend.
- He lucked out with that girl of his. Smart, sweet, sassy, and pretty too.
- There isn't any guy going to steal my girl!1922, Edgar Rice Burroughs, The Girl from Hollywood
(colloquial) One's daughter.
- Your girl turned up on our doorstep. She was crying about the argument on the playground. We let her vent.
(especially) A female friend.
A female non-human animal, especially, in affectionate address, a female pet, especially a dog.
- Hey, Tricksy, come here, girl! Do you want a treat? Yes, you love those biscuits, don't you! What a good girl! Here's another!
- Sheila – 9yo Blue Cattle Dog x. Lovely girl seeks forever home.2025 March 9, Australian Cattle Dog Rescue
(childish) A female (tree, gene, etc).
- Are you getting a boy cat or a girl cat?
- Are there “boy” trees and “girl” trees? Yes. A number of species, among them the yew, holly and date-bearing palm, have their male and female flowers on different trees. The male holly, for instance, must be planted fairly close to the female ...1950, Pageant, page 51
(informal) A machine or vehicle, especially one that the speaker uses often and is fond of.
- The old girl ain't as pretty as she once was, but she still purrs like a kitten and still gets out of her own way!
- Daly came, delved into the old girl's inner works, and had her working in jig time.1917 June 29, Les Enfant, “The Trials of Commuter Jones—a Would-Be Pumber”, in Metal Worker, Pumber, and Steam Fitter, volume 87, number 26, page 874
A female servant; a maid. (see usage notes)
- He assumed that the girls should clean up his giant mess. We straightened out his misconception.
Synonyms:

char, charlady, charwoman, maid, maiden, maidservant, womanservant
(US, slang, uncountable) Cocaine, especially in powder form.
- He's the sort of lowlife who snorts coke and refers to it as his girl.
- She had taught me to snort girl, and almost always when I came to her pad, there would be thin sparkling rows of crystal cocaine on the glass top of the cocktail table.1969, Iceberg Slim, Pimp: The Story of My Life, Cash Money Content, published 2011, →ISBN, page 43
Synonyms:

benzoylmethylecgonine, blow, Bolivian marching powder, booger sugar, boots, California corn flakes, charlie, ching, coke, corinne
(slang, uncommon) A queen (the playing card).
- Are your sure you want to discard that old girl?
(UK, dialectal, obsolete) A roebuck two years old.
(obsolete) A child of any gender.

Verb

girl (third-person singular simple present girls, present participle girling, simple past and past participle girled)

(transitive) To feminize or girlify; to gender as a girl or as for girls.
- Quite different is the way in which the tomboy girled the rebel narrative. In recent years, queer theorists have taken a deep interest in the tomboy as a prefigure for the butch dyke.2005, Leerom Medovoi, Rebels: Youth and the Cold War Origins of Identity, page 293
- One can argue that the genre “yuppified” the popular romance novel or perhaps “girled” the not especially gender-specific concept of the young urban professional.2011, Stephanie Harzewski, Chick Lit and Postfeminism
(informal) To staff with or as a girl or girls.
- Making our way past a one-girl switchboard temporarily girled by two frantic operators, we found the victorious president, Elliott A. Bowles, barely visible behind a heap of telegrams [...]1949, The New Yorker
- Her first shock came when the ship on which she and her husband arrived was met by three boats “girled” by “great, splendid creatures, as tall as our millionaires' tallest daughters, and as strong-looking as any of our college-girl athletes,” ...1961, The Georgia Review, volume 15, page 228

Proper noun capitalized: Girl

Girl

A Chinese constellation located near Aquarius, one of the 28 lunar mansions and part of the Black Turtle.
- Firstly, the ancient Chinese noticed that it is in the seventh lunar month of the year when the Ox mansion (牛宿, to which the Star of the Weaving Girl and the Cowherd star belong) and the Girl Mansion (女宿) both appear in the night sky: according to Book of Rites (《禮記》) edited by Confucius, the Girl...(Can we date this quote?), Yuxuan Cai, “DOUBLE SEVENTH FESTIVAL or 七(Qī)夕(Xì)七(Qī)巧(Qiǎo)如(Rú)意(Yì)果(Guǒ) (V, GF)”, in Yuxuan Cai, editor, Chinese Street Market (Blog), archived from the original on...

girl meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu

girl in Hindi

young female person: लड़की laṛkī, कन्या kanyā, युवती yuvtī, बालिका bālikā, किशोरी kiśorī, छोरी chorī
woman — see also woman: महिला mahilā, स्त्री strī, नारी nārī
female servant: सेविका sevikā

girl in Tamil

young female person: சிறுமி ciṟumi, பெண் peṇ

girl in Urdu

young female person: لَڑْکی laṛkī

More languagesFewer languages

girl in Bengali: মেয়ে meẏe
girl in Telugu: అమ్మాయి ammāyi, కన్య kanya, బాలిక bālika, పిల్ల pilla
girl in Malayalam: പെൺകുട്ടി peṇkuṭṭi, പെണ്ണ് peṇṇŭ, സ്ത്രീ strī
girl in Kannada: ಹುಡುಗಿ huḍugi
girl in Punjabi: ਕੁੜੀ kuṛī
girl in Gujarati: છોકરી chokrī, કિશોરી kiśorī, ગીગી gīgī
girl in Odia: ଟୋକଳୀ Ṭokaḻī
girl in Sanskrit: बाला bālā, कन्या kanyā
girl in Assamese: ছোৱালী süali
girl in Nepali: केटी keṭī
girl in Pashto: نجلۍ nǰələi, ووړکۍ worrkəi
girl in Tagalog: babae, batang babae, dalaga
girl in Arabic: بِنْت bint, فَتَاة fatāh, طِفْلة ṭifla, بنت bent
girl in Malay: gadis
girl in Indonesian: anak perempuan, gadis
girl in Persian: دُخْتَر duxtar, زن zan, بانو bânu, کلفت kolfat
girl in Thai: เด็กผู้หญิง dèk-pûu-yǐng, เด็กหญิง dèk-yǐng, เด็กสาว dèk-sǎao
girl in Vietnamese: cô gái, con gái, gái
girl in Myanmar: သူငယ်မ su-ngaima., မိန်းကလေး min:ka.le:, ကောင်မလေး kaungma.le:
Kashmiri: کوٗر kūr, لٔڑکی lạḍkī, کٔٹ kạṭ

Examples of girl in a sentence

I took my girl to the cinema to watch your American movies.1996, Elizabeth Wong, Kimchee and Chitlins: A Serious Comedy about Getting Along, page 74:
Of the 100 percent total, 25 will have two girl genes, 50 will have one boy and one girl gene, and 25 will have two boy genes.1970 [earlier 1963], Helen V. Wilson, Helen Van Pelt, Helen Van Pelt's African Violets, Dutton Adult
When there are two "girl" genes the plant is a girl dwarf.1972, GSN Gesneriad Saintpaulia News: African Violets, Gloxinias, Other Gesneriads and Exotic Plants, volumes 9–10, page 37:
The tired old girl was listing heavily in the heavy seas.2013, Rose George, Deep Sea and Foreign Going:

All 40 example sentences with girl

Synonyms of girl

30 more synonymsFewer synonyms

Antonyms

woman
boy

All synonyms and antonyms of girl

Forms of girl

Noun
plural	girls
alternative Internet	gorl
alternative Internet	gril
alternative form	gyal
alternative form (colloquial)	gal
alternative form (colloquial)	guhl
alternative UK (slang)	gel
alternative form (obsolete)	girle
alternative form (obsolete)	gyrle
alternative form (slang)	grrrl
alternative form (slang)	grrl
alternative form (nonstandard)	guhrl
alternative form (nonstandard)	gurl
alternative form (slang)	gworl
Verb
third-person singular present	girls
present participle	girling
past participle	girled
past	girled

Plural of girl: girls

Origin of girl

From Middle English gerle, girle, gyrle (“young person (boy or girl)”), perhaps from Old English *gyrele, from Proto-West Germanic *gurilā, from a zero-grade diminutive of *gaurā (“young child”) + *-ilā. Ultimately of unknown origin. Doublet of gal/gyal and gyaru. Cognates Cognate with Yola gurl (“child, girl”), German Gör, Göre (“brat, cheeky young child”), Low German Gör (“child”).

Calque of Mandarin 女宿 (Nǚxiù).

Words formed from girl

Phrases with girl

155 more phrasesFewer phrases

Words that rhyme with girl

25 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about girl

What does girl mean?: Girl means a female child.
What is girl in Hindi?: Girl in Hindi is लड़की (laṛkī), कन्या (kanyā), युवती (yuvtī). See Girl meaning in Hindi.
How do you use girl in a sentence?: I took my girl to the cinema to watch your American movies.
What part of speech is girl?: Girl can be a noun, a verb or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce girl?: Girl is pronounced /ˈɡɜːl/ (UK).
What is the plural of girl?: The plural of girl is girls.

Words near girl in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: girl (page history and authors); Girl (page history and authors); કિશોરી (Gujarati) (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: 2026-09-02

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

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