haul

UK/hɔːl/

More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations

Australia/hoːl/

haul verb: to transport by drawing or pulling, as with horses or oxen, or a motor vehicle. Also the ellipsis of haul video.

Verb

haul (third-person singular simple present hauls, present participle hauling, simple past and past participle hauled)

(transitive) To transport by drawing or pulling, as with horses or oxen, or a motor vehicle.
- to haul logs to a sawmill
- When I was seven or eight years of age, I began hauling all the wood used in the house and shops. I could not load it on the wagons, of course, at the time, but I could drive [the horses], and the choppers would load, and some one at the house unload.1885, Ulysses S. Grant, “Ancestry—Birth—Boyhood”, in Personal Memoirs of U. S. Grant. In Two Volumes, volume I, New York, N.Y.: Charles L. Webster & Company, →OCLC, page 26
(transitive) To draw or pull something heavy.
- Thither they bent, and haul'd their ſhip to land, / (The crooked keel divides the yellow ſand) / Ulyſſes ſleeping on his couch they bore, / And gently plac'd him on the rocky ſhore.1725, Homer, “Book XIII”, in [Alexander Pope], transl., The Odyssey of Homer. […], volume III, London: […] Bernard Lintot, →OCLC, page 194, lines 136–139
- A spacious breach we make, and Troy's proud wall, / Built by the gods, by her own hands doth fall; / Thus all their help to their own ruin give, / Some draw with cords and some the monster drive / With rolls and levers: thus our works it climbs, / Big with our fate; the youth with songs and rhimes...1810, John Denham, “The Destruction of Troy. An Essay on the Second Book of Virgil’s Æneis. Written in the Year 1636.”, in Alexander Chalmers, edited by Samuel Johnson, The Works of the English...
(transitive) To carry or transport something, with a connotation that the item is heavy or otherwise difficult to move.
- The California fruit trade is all handled by the Southern Pacific and the Santa Fe railroads. The last named road operates its own refrigerator cars and fixes its own rates. It hauls fully half of the traffic and it is therefore evident that the "Beef Trust" has no voice or power in the matter. […]...1905 February 4, “Why Not Tell the Truth?”, in W. M. Camp, editor, The Railway and Engineering Review, volume XLV, number 5, Chicago, Ill.: Railway Review Inc. […], →OCLC, page 73, column 1
(figuratively, transitive) To drag, to pull, to tug.
- The 26-year-old [Papiss Cissé] has proved a revelation since his £10m move from Freiburg, with his 11 goals in 10 matches hauling Newcastle above Spurs, who went down to Adel Taarabt's goal in Saturday's late kick-off at Loftus Road.2012 April 21, Jonathan Jurejko, “Newcastle 3 – 0 Stoke”, in BBC Sport, archived from the original on 12 Sep 2018
(figuratively, transitive) Followed by up: to summon to be disciplined or held answerable for something.
- Well, it is impossible to carry stock by train or steamer without causing some pain or suffering, and to be hauled up before a Justice of the Peace […] without a warrant because somebody thinks you have caused unnecessary pain seems to me to be an outrageous proceeding. […] [T]o enact a Draconian...1908 August 6, William Herbert Herries, “Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Bill”, in New Zealand. Parliamentary Debates. Fourth Session, Sixteenth Parliament (House of Representatives), volume 144...
(intransitive) To pull apart, as oxen sometimes do when yoked.
(ambitransitive) To steer (a vessel) closer to the wind.
- When the Admiral hauls out of the Line, and remains ſo for ſome Accident, although the Signal for the Line is flying, and the Signal for Battle then out, ought not the other Ships to continue in the Line, doing their Duty, engaging the Enemy?1745 October 7, Charles Fearne, “The Trial at Large of Captain George Burrish, […]”, in Minutes of the Proceedings of a Court-Martial, Assembled on the 23d of September, 1745, […] to Enquire into the...
- On Tueſday the 4th of April, about ten o'clock in the morning, Mr. Banks's ſervant, Peter Briſcoe, diſcovered land, bearing fourth, at the diſtance of about three or four leagues. I immediately hauled up for it, and found it to be an iſland of an oval form, with a lagoon in the middle, which...1769 April 4, James Cook, “[An Account of a Voyage around the World, in the Years MDCCLXVIII, MDCCLXIX, MDCCLXX, and MDCCLXXI. By Lieutenant James Cook, Commander of His Majesty’s Bark the...
Antonyms:

veer
(intransitive) Of the wind: to shift fore (more towards the bow).
- The wind, serving us to a desire, now hauled into the west.1881–1882, Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island, London; Paris: Cassell & Company, published 14 November 1883, →OCLC
Antonyms:

veer
(US, colloquial, intransitive) To haul ass (“go fast”).
- “How fast was he goin’?” / “I don’t know exactly, but he must’ve been haulin’, given where he landed.”

Noun

haul (plural hauls)

An act of hauling or pulling, particularly with force; a (violent) pull or tug.
- So I rigged my big salmon rod, and when I heard him splashing in the shallows across the pool, I put a few Alka Seltzer tablets onto the hook and cast into the darkness. There was a splash and a haul on my line, and this time I struck with both hands and then began pulling and horsing as hard as I...1971, Sparse Grey Hackle [pseudonym], “Who is Sparse Grey Hackle?”, in Fishless Days, Angling Nights, New York, N.Y.: Crown Publishers, →OCLC; republished as Fishless Days, Angling Nights: Classic...
- Then another series of hollered orders, a heave on the wheel, and the brig did a circuit of the flagship's bow, perilously close to the long bowsprit. A haul at the braces and back along the larboard side of the Vincennes the Swallow ran, losing speed but still sending foam seething along the hull...2004, Joan Druett, chapter 6, in A Watery Grave (Wiki Coffin Adventure; 1), New York, N.Y.: St. Martin’s Minotaur, →ISBN; republished as A Watery Grave (Wiki Coffin Mysteries; 1), New York, N.Y.: St....
The distance over which something is hauled or transported, especially if long.
- Getting to his place was a real haul.
- I find long-haul travel by airplane tiring.
An amount of something that has been taken, especially of fish, illegal loot, or items purchased on a shopping trip.
- The robber’s haul was over thirty items.
- The trawler landed a ten-ton haul.
Synonyms:

booty
A bundle of many threads to be tarred.
- When the collected yarns number about 400, they are coiled up in a haul, and are ready either for tarring, or laying into white ropes. Previous to the haul being taken up for tarring, there is a slight turn put into it to keep it from getting entangled in the tar-kettle. […] 400 of such threads...1842, B. S., “Rope-making”, in Macvey Napier, editor, The Encyclopædia Britannica, Or Dictionary of Arts, Sciences, and General Literature, 7th edition, volume XIX, issue 2, Edinburgh: Adam and...
(UK) Four goals scored by one player in a game.
- Four goals scored by a single player in a match can be described as a 'haul', while five goals is unofficially a 'glut'.2020 October 23, “What is a brace in soccer?”, in Goal
Synonyms:

poker

Also used as

haul is also the ellipsis of haul video.

Examples of haul in a sentence

This is the signal for a general chase after an imaginary enemy, a chase which continues till he hauls down his flag and fires another gun.1912, A. Rogers, “Yachting”, in The Encyclopædia of Sport & Games: In Four Volumes, The Sportsman edition, volumes IV (Rackets–Zebra)...
The cable used for hauling the wagons on the incline may still be seen, but several of the guiding rollers have disappeared.1947 March and April, “Notes and News: The Edge Hill Light Railway”, in Railway Magazine, page 116:
I immediately hauled up for it, and found it to be an iſland of an oval form, with a lagoon in the middle, which occupied much the larger part of it; […]1769 April 4, James Cook, “[An Account of a Voyage around the World, in the Years MDCCLXVIII, MDCCLXIX, MDCCLXX, and MDCCLXXI. By...
A veſſel ſailing as near as ſhe can to the point from which the wind blows, is ſaid to be cloſe hauled.1780, J[ohn] Robertson, William Wales, “Section VII. Of Sailing to Windward.”, in The Elements of Navigation; Containing the Theory and...

All 40 example sentences with haul

Synonyms of haul

booty
poker

Antonyms

veer

Forms of haul

Verb
third-person singular present	hauls
present participle	hauling
past participle	hauled
past	hauled
Noun
plural	hauls

Past tense of haul: hauled

Plural of haul: hauls

Origin of haul

From Middle English hālen, hailen, haulen, halien (“to drag, pull; to draw up”), from Old French haler (“to haul, pull”), from Frankish *halōn (“to drag, fetch, haul”) or Middle Dutch halen (“to drag, fetch, haul”), possibly merging with Old English *halian (“to haul, drag”); all from Proto-Germanic *halōną, *halēną, *hulōną (“to call, fetch, summon”), from Proto-Indo-European *kelh₁- (“to call, cry, summon”). The noun is derived from the verb. Cognates The word is cognate with Danish hale (“to haul”), Middle Dutch halen (“to draw, fetch, haul”), Dutch halen (“to fetch, bring, haul”), Old Frisian halia, Saterland Frisian halen (“to draw, haul, pull”), Low German halen (“to draw, pull”), Old High German halôn, holôn, German holen (“to fetch, get”), Norwegian hale (“to haul”), Old Saxon halôn (“to fetch, get”), Swedish hala (“to hale, haul, pull, tug”), and related to Old English ġeholian (“to get, obtain”).

Words formed from haul

Phrases with haul

Words that rhyme with haul

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about haul

What does haul mean?: Haul means to transport by drawing or pulling, as with horses or oxen, or a motor vehicle.
How do you use haul in a sentence?: This is the signal for a general chase after an imaginary enemy, a chase which continues till he hauls down his flag and fires another gun.
What part of speech is haul?: Haul can be a verb or a noun.
How do you pronounce haul?: Haul is pronounced /hɔːl/ (UK).
What is the past tense of haul?: The past tense of haul is hauled.

Words near haul in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: haul (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: en-au-haul.ogg.

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