Word.ws English Dictionary

guffaw

UK/ɡəˈfɔː//ɡəˈfɔ/

guffaw noun: a boisterous laugh.

Noun

guffaw (plural guffaws)

  1. A boisterous laugh.
    • On opening the little door, two hairy monsters flew at my throat, bearing me down, and extinguishing the light; while a mingled guffaw from Heathcliff and Hareton put the copestone on my rage and humiliation.1847 December, Ellis Bell [pseudonym; Emily Brontë], Wuthering Heights: […], volume II, London: Thomas Cautley Newby, […], →OCLC
    • He walked to the edge and they heard his hoarse guffaw of laughter as the arrows clanged and clattered against his impenetrable mail.1905–1906, Arthur Conan Doyle, chapter XX, in Sir Nigel, London: Smith, Elder & Co., […], published January 1906, →OCLC
    Synonyms:
    belly laugh

Verb

guffaw (third-person singular simple present guffaws, present participle guffawing, simple past and past participle guffawed)

  1. (intransitive) To laugh boisterously.
    • He guffawed at his adversaries.1891, Oscar Wilde, chapter 15, in The Picture of Dorian Gray
    • Peter, on the contrary, threw back his head and guffawed thunderously.1900, Stephen Crane, The Knife

guffaw meaning in Urdu, Bengali, Malayalam and Kannada

guffaw in Urdu

قہقہہ, قہقہہ لگانا

guffaw in Bengali

অট্টহাসি, উচ্চৈঃস্বরে হাসি

guffaw in Malayalam

a boisterous laugh
പൊട്ടിച്ചിരി poṭṭicciri

guffaw in Kannada

ಬಿರುನಗು, ಗಹಗಹಿಸಿ ನಗು, ಅಬ್ಬರದ ನಗು, ಕೇಕೆ ಹಾಕಿ ನಗು, ಅಟ್ಟಹಾಸ
More languagesFewer languages
guffaw in Tagalog
halakhak, humalakhak, humahalakhak

Examples of guffaw in a sentence

  • He dug an elbow into my ribs and guffawed at his own joke.
  • He guffawed and gave me a dig in the ribs after telling his latest joke.
  • I actually guffawed when I heard that the guy from The Apprentice was running for president.

All 25 example sentences with guffaw

Synonyms of guffaw

Forms of guffaw

Noun
pluralguffaws
Verb
third-person singular presentguffaws
present participleguffawing
past participleguffawed
pastguffawed

Origin of guffaw

First attested in the early 18th century, originally Scots, probably onomatopoeic.

Words formed from guffaw

Words that rhyme with guffaw

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about guffaw

What does guffaw mean?
Guffaw means a boisterous laugh.
What is guffaw in Urdu?
Guffaw in Urdu is قہقہہ, قہقہہ لگانا. See Guffaw meaning in Urdu.
What part of speech is guffaw?
Guffaw can be a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce guffaw?
Guffaw is pronounced /ɡəˈfɔː/ (UK).
What is the plural of guffaw?
The plural of guffaw is guffaws.

Words near guffaw in the dictionary

  1. guevis
  2. Gueye
  3. Gueyes
  4. guff
  5. guff off
  6. guffaw
  7. guffawed
  8. guffawing
  9. guffawingly
  10. guffawings
  11. guffawish

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: guffaw (page history and authors); guffaw (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); Guffaw (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); guffaw (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-guffaw.ogg, en-au-guffaw.ogg.

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