Word.ws English Dictionary

go walkabout

go walkabout verb: to go missing from its usual place; to be lost or stolen.

Verb

go walkabout (third-person singular simple present goes walkabout, present participle going walkabout, simple past went walkabout, past participle gone walkabout)

  1. (Australia, UK, colloquial) To go missing from its usual place; to be lost or stolen.
    • The paper shredder seems to have gone walkabout.
    Synonyms:
    go walkies
  2. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see go, walkabout.
    • You could almost hear him shout 'Geronimo'. It was bound to end in tears. Sure enough when his owner had let him go walkabout on the kitchen table he had taken his chance, raced for the edge, and made his own giant leap for hamsterkind.1995, Nigel Taylor, A vet called Nigel, page 58

Synonyms of go walkabout

Forms of go walkabout

third-person singular presentgoes walkabout
present participlegoing walkabout
pastwent walkabout
past participlegone walkabout

Questions about go walkabout

What does go walkabout mean?
Go walkabout means to go missing from its usual place; to be lost or stolen.
What part of speech is go walkabout?
Go walkabout is a verb.
What is the past tense of go walkabout?
The past tense of go walkabout is went walkabout.

Words near go walkabout in the dictionary

  1. go up in flames
  2. go up in smoke
  3. go up in the world
  4. go upstairs
  5. go viral
  6. go walkabout
  7. go walkies
  8. go walking
  9. go way back
  10. go west
  11. go whacks

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: go walkabout (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-AU ck1 go walkabout.ogg.

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