Word.ws English Dictionary

hydroplane

UK/ˈhaɪdɹəʊˌpleɪn//ˈhaɪdɹoʊˌpleɪn/

hydroplane verb: to skim the surface of a body of water while moving at high speed.

Verb

hydroplane (third-person singular simple present hydroplanes, present participle hydroplaning, simple past and past participle hydroplaned)

  1. (intransitive) To skim the surface of a body of water while moving at high speed.
  2. (intransitive) For a car or similar vehicle to slide along the road on a thin film of water between the road and the tyres. This occurs when a car has some speed and comes to somewhere with more water on the road than the weight of the car and the grooves in the tyre tread pattern (if any) can push away. The result is almost no traction at all for steering or braking.
    • Don't drive too fast on wet roads or the car may hydroplane and cause you to lose control of the vehicle.
    Synonyms:
    aquaplane

Noun

hydroplane (plural hydroplanes)

  1. (intransitive) A specific type of motorboat used exclusively for racing.
  2. (intransitive, aircraft) A seaplane; any aircraft capable of taking off from, and alighting on the surface of water.
  3. (intransitive) A hydrofoil (“boat type”)
  4. (intransitive) A hydrofoil (“hydrodynamic surface”)
  5. (intransitive) The wing of a submarine, used to help control depth

Synonyms of hydroplane

Forms of hydroplane

Verb
third-person singular presenthydroplanes
present participlehydroplaning
past participlehydroplaned
pasthydroplaned
Noun
pluralhydroplanes

Origin of hydroplane

From hydro- + plane.

Questions about hydroplane

What does hydroplane mean?
Hydroplane means to skim the surface of a body of water while moving at high speed.
What part of speech is hydroplane?
Hydroplane can be a verb or a noun.
How do you pronounce hydroplane?
Hydroplane is pronounced /ˈhaɪdɹəʊˌpleɪn/ (UK).
What is the past tense of hydroplane?
The past tense of hydroplane is hydroplaned.

Words near hydroplane in the dictionary

  1. hydropick
  2. hydropillar
  3. hydropillars
  4. hydropiper
  5. hydropipers
  6. hydroplane
  7. hydroplaned
  8. hydroplanes
  9. hydroplaning
  10. hydroplanings
  11. hydroplasm

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: hydroplane (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-hydroplane.ogg, en-au-hydroplane.ogg.

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