Word.ws English Dictionary

highball

US/ˈhaɪˌbɑl/

highball noun: a cocktail made from a spirit plus soda water etc. Also the clipping of highball glass.

highball: a cocktail made from a spirit plus soda water etc
Image: Will Shenton, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

highball (plural highballs)

  1. A cocktail made from a spirit plus soda water etc.
  2. (US) An all clear or full speed ahead signal.
    • A white ball hauled up to the crossbar indicated that the track was clear; a black ball, run up half way, meant stop. This was the origin of the use of the word "highball" to indicate a clear line ahead, which is still used in U.S.A. railway practice.1946 November and December, “Notes and News: The American Highball”, in Railway Magazine, page 382
  3. A very high bouldering problem, often with a hard landing.
    • Austrian all rounder Alex Luger climbs what he describes as a highball boulder problem and what most people would call a solo.2014, EpicTV.com

Verb

highball (third-person singular simple present highballs, present participle highballing, simple past and past participle highballed)

  1. To make an estimate which tends toward exaggeration.
    • If we highball the price, it comes out to $240. If we lowball it, it's closer to $200.
    Antonyms:
    lowball
  2. (US, dated, possibly, slang) To move quickly; to hightail.
    • Booster-equipped 628 highballs west at Glen Lake, Minn., back in 1947.1959, Steam's Finest Hour, edited by David P. Morgan, Kalmbach Publishing Co. (photo caption)
    • The water-level route, the whistle and the loud staccato exhaust of this great engine recalled most vividly memories of the New York Central Hudsons highballing along the Hudson River between Harmon and Albany!1960 October, P. Ransome-Wallis, “Modern motive power of the German Federal Railway: Part Two”, in Trains Illustrated, page 613

Also used as

highball is also the clipping of highball glass.

Antonyms of highball

Forms of highball

Noun
pluralhighballs
Verb
third-person singular presenthighballs
present participlehighballing
past participlehighballed
pasthighballed

Origin of highball

From high + ball, of the same railroad origins as lowball.

Words formed from highball

Phrases with highball

Questions about highball

What does highball mean?
Highball means a cocktail made from a spirit plus soda water etc.
What part of speech is highball?
Highball can be a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce highball?
Highball is pronounced /ˈhaɪˌbɑl/ (US).
What is the plural of highball?
The plural of highball is highballs.

Words near highball in the dictionary

  1. Highams Park
  2. higharched
  3. highback
  4. highbacked
  5. highbacks
  6. highball
  7. highball glass
  8. highball glasses
  9. highballed
  10. highballer
  11. highballers

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: highball (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-highball.ogg.

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