Word.ws English Dictionary

islands

islands is the plural of island.

islands is the third-person singular simple present indicative of island.

Meaning of island

Noun

island (plural islands)

  1. A contiguous area of land, smaller than a continent, totally surrounded by water.
    • No man is an Iland, intire of it ſelfe; euery man is a peece of the Continent, a part of the maine; […]1624, John Donne, “17. Meditation”, in Deuotions upon Emergent Occasions, and Seuerall Steps in My Sicknes: […], London: […] A[ugustine] M[atthews] for Thomas Iones, →OCLC, pages 415–416
  2. (broadly) A contiguous area of land, smaller than a continent, partially surrounded by water; a peninsula; a half-island.
    • Despite its name, Barry Island is actually a peninsula
  3. An entity surrounded by other entities that are very different from itself.
    • The quiet library was an island of tranquility in the noisy, bustling city.
    Synonyms:
    oasis
  4. A superstructure on an aircraft carrier's deck.
  5. A traffic island.
    • the island in the middle of a roundabout
  6. (West-Midlands, broadly) A roundabout; a traffic circle.
    • Dunton island, near Birmingham, is one of the most confusingly labelled islands in the U.K.

See all 18 meanings of island

Proper noun capitalized: Islands

Islands

  1. A district of Hong Kong.
    • Islands District
    • In recent years, the outlying islands have taken on an increasingly important role in catering for the recreational needs of the people of Hong Kong. As part of the Islands District development programme, projects continued throughout the year in both planning and construction to upgrade the living...1989, “Land, Public Works and Utilities”, in Hong Kong 1989: A Review of 1988, Hong Kong: Government Information Services, →ISBN, →OCLC, page 201

Origin of islands

From island, chosen because the district is located in an archipelago on the coast.

Phrases with islands

188 more phrasesFewer phrases

Questions about islands

What does islands mean?
Islands means a district of Hong Kong.
What is islands the plural of?
Islands is the plural of island.
What part of speech is islands?
Islands is a proper noun.

Words near islands in the dictionary

  1. islandophile
  2. islandophiles
  3. islandress
  4. islandresses
  5. islandry
  6. islands
  7. Islands of Hawaii
  8. islands of inversion
  9. islands of Reil
  10. islands of stability
  11. Islands of the Blessed

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: islands (page history and authors); Islands (page history and authors); island (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: LL-Q1860 (eng)-PerfectSoundWhatever-islands.wav, en-us-islands.ogg.

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