Word.ws English Dictionary

lightning bug

lightning bug noun: a firefly.

Noun

lightning bug (plural lightning bugs)

  1. A firefly.
    • I watched as lightning bugs drifted in, glowing yellow against the shadows.2019, Ta-Nehisi Coates, The Water Dancer, Penguin Books (2020), page 18

Forms of lightning bug

plurallightning bugs

Origin of lightning bug

From lightning + bug, because the insects glow; whence also firefly. Compare glow fly, glowworm, and lanternfly.

Words formed from lightning bug

Questions about lightning bug

What does lightning bug mean?
Lightning bug means a firefly.
What part of speech is lightning bug?
Lightning bug is a noun.
What is the plural of lightning bug?
The plural of lightning bug is lightning bugs.

Words near lightning bug in the dictionary

  1. lightning bird
  2. lightning birds
  3. lightning bolt
  4. lightning bolts
  5. lightning bruiser
  6. lightning bug
  7. lightning bugs
  8. lightning carrier
  9. lightning carriers
  10. lightning chess
  11. lightning conductor

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: lightning bug (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.

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