Word.ws English Dictionary

nosing

nosing is the present participle and gerund of nose.

Noun

nosing (plural nosings)

  1. An animal's pushing or exploration with the nose.
    • The hours of the day often follow such a beginning like a wagging tail follows through the nosings and affections and fireside dreamings of a happy dog.1982, Dave Hughes, An Angler's Astoria
  2. That part of the treadboard of a stair that projects over the riser.
  3. Any similar projection, such as the projecting edge of a moulding.

Meaning of nose

Verb

nose (third-person singular simple present noses, present participle nosing, simple past and past participle nosed)

  1. (intransitive) To move cautiously by advancing its front end.
    • The ship nosed through the minefield.
  2. (also, ambitransitive, idiomatic, intransitive) To snoop.
    • She was nosing around other people’s business.
  3. (transitive) To detect by smell or as if by smell.
    • […] if you finde him not this moneth, you ſhall noſe him as you go vp the ſtaires into the Lobby.c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac...
  4. (transitive) To push with one's nose; to nuzzle.
    • [L]ambs are glad / Nosing the mother's udder, and the bird / Makes his heart voice among the blaze of flowers: […]1868, Alfred Tennyson, “Lucretius”, in The Holy Grail and Other Poems, London: Strahan and Co., […], published 1870, →OCLC, page 211
  5. (transitive) To defeat (as in a race or other contest) by a narrow margin; sometimes with out.
  6. (transitive) To utter in a nasal manner; to pronounce with a nasal twang.
    • to nose a prayer

See all 23 meanings of nose

Forms of nosing

pluralnosings

Phrases with nosing

Words that rhyme with nosing

Questions about nosing

What does nosing mean?
Nosing means an animal's pushing or exploration with the nose.
What is nosing the present participle and gerund of?
Nosing is the present participle and gerund of nose.
What part of speech is nosing?
Nosing is a noun.
What is the plural of nosing?
The plural of nosing is nosings.

Words near nosing in the dictionary

  1. nosiest
  2. nosiheptide
  3. nosily
  4. nosiness
  5. nosinesses
  6. nosing
  7. nosing about
  8. nosing around
  9. nosing out
  10. nosing over
  11. nosings

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: nosing (page history and authors); nose (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: “nosing.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/nosing. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.