love handle
love handle noun: a protruding area of fat on the side of the body, above the hips.
Noun
love handle (plural love handles)
- A protruding area of fat on the side of the body, above the hips.
- The good news. Three weeks into the programme I am rediscovering bits of my body I had forgotten existed; biceps, triceps, hamstrings and those funny muscles on the sides of the abdomen called obliques, the toning of which is supposed to eliminate the love handle.2017 November 16, Jo Ellison, “Help: the gym has turned us into slobs”, in Financial Times, archived from the original on 10 Mar 2025
- Synonyms:
- spare tire, spare tyre
love handle meaning in Malay
love handle in Malay
- protruding area of fat on the side of the body
- geleber pinggang
Synonyms of love handle
Forms of love handle
| plural | love handles |
|---|---|
| alternative form | lovehandle |
Origin of love handle
First appears c. 1970 in the publication Current Slang. So called because it is supposed to be grabbed by a partner during sexual intercourse.
Words formed from love handle
Questions about love handle
- What does love handle mean?
- Love handle means a protruding area of fat on the side of the body, above the hips.
- What is love handle in Malay?
- Love handle in Malay is geleber pinggang. See Love handle meaning in Malay.
- What part of speech is love handle?
- Love handle is a noun.
- What is the plural of love handle?
- The plural of love handle is love handles.
Words near love handle in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: love handle (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)-Flame, not lame-love handle.wav.
Cite this entry: “love handle.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/love_handle. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.