knife

/ˈnɐɪ̯f//ˈnaɪ̯f/

knife noun: a utensil or a tool designed for cutting, consisting of a flat piece of hard material, usually steel or other metal (the blade), usually sharpened on one edge, attached to a handle. The blade may be pointed for piercing.

Image: Frank C. Müller, Baden-Baden, CC BY-SA 2.0 de, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

knife (plural knives)

A utensil or a tool designed for cutting, consisting of a flat piece of hard material, usually steel or other metal (the blade), usually sharpened on one edge, attached to a handle. The blade may be pointed for piercing.
- He was looking for a knife to chop some steak.
- Jeff was bent low over the backboard, working with the knife, a steady sawing motion, his shirt soaked through with sweat.2007, Scott Smith, The Ruins, page 273
A weapon designed with the aforementioned specifications intended for slashing or stabbing but too short to be called a sword; a dagger.
Any blade-like part in a tool or a machine designed for cutting, such as that of a chipper.

Verb

knife (third-person singular simple present knifes, present participle knifing, simple past and past participle knifed)

(transitive) To cut with a knife.
(transitive) To use a knife to injure or kill by stabbing, slashing, or otherwise using the sharp edge of the knife as a weapon.
- She was repeatedly knifed in the chest.
- One day his sergeant began to cane him, on which, seizing his knife, he knifed the sergeant : he knifed the privates : he knifed until he was finally overpowered, and, brought before a court-martial, was condemned to fifteen years at the galleys.1843, The Foreign Quarterly Review, volume 31, Treuttel and Würtz, Treuttel, Jun, and Richter, page 236
(intransitive) To cut through as if with a knife.
- The boat knifed through the water.
(transitive) To betray, especially in the context of a political slate.

Synonyms:

burn, quisle, stab in the back, assfuck, betray, cop out, cross out, cross up, double-cross, do someone dirty
(transitive) To positively ignore, especially in order to denigrate; compare cut.

knife meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu

knife in Hindi

utensil or tool designed for cutting: छुरी churī, चाक़ू cāqū

knife in Tamil

utensil or tool designed for cutting: கத்தி katti

knife in Marathi

utensil or tool designed for cutting: सुरी surī

knife in Urdu

utensil or tool designed for cutting: چُھری churī, چاقُو cāqū, کارْد kārd

More languagesFewer languages

knife in Bengali: ছুরি churi, চাকু caku
knife in Telugu: కత్తి katti
knife in Malayalam: കത്തി katti
knife in Kannada: ಚಾಕು cāku, ಕತ್ತಿ katti
knife in Punjabi: ਚਾਕੂ cākū
knife in Gujarati: છરી charī
knife in Odia: ଛୁରୀ churi
knife in Sanskrit: छुरी churī
knife in Sinhala: දණහිස daṇahisa
knife in Assamese: ছুৰী suri
knife in Nepali: चक्कु cakku
knife in Pashto: چاقو čâqú, چاړه čāṛᶕ
knife in Tagalog: kampit, kutsilyo
knife in Arabic: سِكِّين sikkīn, مُدْيَة mudya, سكينة sikkīna, سچين siččīn
knife in Malay: pisau
knife in Indonesian: pisau
knife in Persian: چَاقُو čāqū, کارْد kârd, چاقو čâġu, پِچَق pečaġ
knife in Thai: มีด mîit, พร้า práa
knife in Vietnamese: dao
knife in Myanmar: ဓား dha:
Sindhi: چاقون cāqūṁ
Dhivehi: ވަޅި vaḷi
Dzongkha: ཀ་ཀྲ་ལ ka kra la

Examples of knife in a sentence

He ratted a vertical line on his face with a pocket knife.
I keep my knives sharp so that they don't slip unexpectedly while carving.
He smuggled a knife into prison with a view to using it as a weapon.

All 40 example sentences with knife

Synonyms of knife

14 more synonymsFewer synonyms

All synonyms of knife

Forms of knife

Noun
plural	knives
alternative uncommon verb	knive
alternative noun (obsolete)	knyfe
Verb
third-person singular present	knifes
present participle	knifing
past participle	knifed
past	knifed

Plural of knife: knives

Origin of knife

From Middle English knyf, knif, from late Old English cnīf, from Old Norse knífr or Proto-West Germanic *knīb, from Proto-Germanic *knībaz, from *knīpaną (“to pinch”), Proto-Indo-European *gneybʰ- (compare Lithuanian gnýbti, žnýbti (“to pinch”), gnaibis (“pinching”)). Displaced native Middle English sax (“knife”), from Old English seax; and Middle English coutel, qwetyll (“knife”) from Old French coutel. * The verb is first attested in 1865. The variant knive is first attested in 1733. Cognates Cognate with Yola kunnife (“knife”), North Frisian knif (“knife”), Dutch knijf (“long pointy knife, poniard”), German Knifte (“rifle; thick slicebread”), German Low German Knief (“knife”), Luxembourgish Knäip (“paring knife”), Danish, Norwegian Bokmål, and Norwegian Nynorsk kniv (“knife”), Faroese knívur (“knife”), Icelandic hnífur, knífur (“knife”), Swedish knif, kniv (“knife”).

Phrases with knife

157 more phrasesFewer phrases

Words that rhyme with knife

6 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about knife

What does knife mean?: Knife means a utensil or a tool designed for cutting, consisting of a flat piece of hard material, usually steel or other metal (the blade), usually sharpened on one edge, attached to a handle. The blade may be pointed for piercing.
What is knife in Hindi?: Knife in Hindi is छुरी (churī), चाक़ू (cāqū). See Knife meaning in Hindi.
What part of speech is knife?: Knife can be a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce knife?: Knife is pronounced /ˈnaɪ̯f/ (UK).
What is the plural of knife?: The plural of knife is knives.

Words near knife in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: knife (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-uk-a knife.ogg, En-us-knife.ogg.

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