Word.ws English Dictionary

owl

/aʊ(ə)l/

owl noun: any of various birds of prey of the order Strigiformes, families Strigidae and Tytonidae, that are primarily nocturnal and have forward-looking, binocular vision, limited eye movement, and good hearing.

owl: any of various birds of prey of the order Strigiformes, families Strigidae and Tytonidae, that are...
Image: Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun (1)

owl (plural owls)

  1. Any of various birds of prey of the order Strigiformes, families Strigidae and Tytonidae, that are primarily nocturnal and have forward-looking, binocular vision, limited eye movement, and good hearing.
    • A group of owls is called a parliament.2019 June 6, “A gaggle, a confusion and a conspiracy - bizarre animal collective group names”, in BBC
  2. (broadly) A person seen as having owl-like characteristics, especially appearing wise or serious, or being nocturnally active.
    Antonyms:
    lark
  3. An owl pigeon.
  4. (uncommon) A politician with moderate views that are neither hawkish nor dovish.
  5. Any of various nymphalid butterflies, especially in the genus Caligo, having large eyespots on the wings.

Verb

owl (third-person singular simple present owls, present participle owling, simple past and past participle owled)

  1. (archaic, intransitive) To smuggle contraband goods.

Noun (2) capitalized: OWL

OWL (plural OWLs)

  1. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of Older Women's League.
  2. (abbreviation, initialism) Initialism of Web Ontology Language (The order of the letters is discussed at Web Ontology Language § Acronym.)

Noun (3) capitalized: Owl

Owl (plural Owls)

  1. (slang) A player or fan of Sheffield Wednesday Football Club.

owl meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu

owl in Hindi

bird
उल्लू ullū, पेचक pecak, उलूक ulūk, कुचकुचवा kuckucvā, खुसट khusaṭ, घूक ghūk

owl in Tamil

bird
ஆந்தை āntai, கூகை kūkai

owl in Marathi

bird
घुबड ghubaḍ

owl in Urdu

bird
الو ullū
More languagesFewer languages
owl in Bengali
পেঁচা pẽca, উলূক uluk, পেচক pecok
owl in Telugu
గుడ్లగూబ guḍlagūba, గూబ gūba
owl in Malayalam
മൂങ്ങ mūṅṅa
owl in Kannada
ಗೂಬೆ gūbe, ಘೂಕ ghūka
owl in Odia
ପେଚା pecā
owl in Sanskrit
उलूक ulūka, पेचक pecaka, घूक ghūka
owl in Assamese
ফেঁচা phẽsa
owl in Nepali
लाटोकोसेरो lāṭokosero, उल्लू ullū, उल्लु ullu, उलूक ulūk
owl in Pashto
کونګ kong
owl in Tagalog
kuwago
owl in Arabic
بُومَة būma
owl in Malay
burung hantu, burung suangi, pungguk
owl in Indonesian
burung hantu, burung suangi, celepuk, jampuk
owl in Persian
جغد joġd, بوف buf
owl in Thai
นกฮูก nók hûuk
owl in Vietnamese
cú
Dzongkha
འུག་པ 'ug pa

Examples of owl in a sentence

  • She's traipsed off to Borneo to see the lesser spotted pygmy owl, or something like that.
  • I heard the hoot of an owl. Whoo, whoo!
  • Owls prey on small mammals, such as mice.

All 40 example sentences with owl

Antonyms of owl

Forms of owl

Noun
pluralowls
pluralOWLs
pluralOwls
Verb
third-person singular presentowls
present participleowling
past participleowled
pastowled

Plural of owl: owls

Origin of owl

From Middle English howle, oul, oule, owle, owlle, from Old English ūle, from Proto-West Germanic *uwwulā, from Proto-Germanic *uwwulǭ (“owl”), diminutive of *uwwǭ (“eagle-owl”), of imitative origin or a variant of *ūfaz, *ūfǭ, from Proto-Indo-European *up- (“to cry out”). Cognates Cognate with Scots oul (“owl”), Saterland Frisian Ule (“owl”), West Frisian ûle (“owl”), Cimbrian aul (“owl”), Dutch uil (“owl”), German Eule (“owl”), Low German Uul (“owl”), Luxembourgish Eil (“owl”), Vilamovian aojł (“own”), Yiddish אײַל (ayl, “owl”), Danish and Norwegian Bokmål ugle (“owl”), Faroese ugla (“owl”), Icelandic uggla, ugla (“owl”), Norwegian Nynorsk ugla, ule (“owl”), Swedish uggla, uv (“owl”); also Bulgarian вопъл (vopăl, “cry, howl, scream”), въпия (văpija, “to weep, yell”), Czech úpět (“to howl, wail”), Russian вопи́ть (vopítʹ, “to howl, scream, yell”), вопия́ть (vopijátʹ, “to appeal; to scream, yell; to lament, wail”), вопль (voplʹ, “cry, scream, wail”), Serbo-Croatian ва̀пити, vàpiti (“to cry out; to scream”), Slovene vpíti (“to scream, yell”).

Named from the Owlerton stadium where they used to play.

Words formed from owl

Phrases with owl

38 more phrasesFewer phrases

Words that rhyme with owl

15 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about owl

What does owl mean?
Owl means any of various birds of prey of the order Strigiformes, families Strigidae and Tytonidae, that are primarily nocturnal and have forward-looking, binocular vision, limited eye movement, and good hearing.
What is owl in Hindi?
Owl in Hindi is उल्लू (ullū), पेचक (pecak), उलूक (ulūk). See Owl meaning in Hindi.
What part of speech is owl?
Owl can be a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce owl?
Owl is pronounced /aʊ(ə)l/.
What is the plural of owl?
The plural of owl is owls.

Words near owl in the dictionary

  1. owing to
  2. owings
  3. Owingses
  4. Owingsville
  5. OWIs
  6. owl
  7. owl bus
  8. owl butterflies
  9. owl butterfly
  10. owl clover
  11. owl hoot

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: owl (page history and authors); OWL (page history and authors); Owl (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: en-us-owl.ogg.

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