pal
/pæl/
pal noun: a friend, buddy, mate, cobber; someone to hang around with. Also the alternative form of paul.
Noun (1)
pal (plural pals)
- A friend, buddy, mate, cobber; someone to hang around with.
- Little Timmy's out playing with his pals.
- "Mob job. The Mafia has a sample of the drug for the first time, thanks to me and my pal Ng. Until now, it always self-destructed before they could get to it. So I guess they're analyzing it or something. Trying to make an antidote, maybe."1992, Neal Stephenson, Snow Crash, page 233
- An informal term of address, often used ironically in a hostile way.
- Don't you threaten me, pal – I'll report you to the police.
- Michael De Santa (Ned Luke): You forget a thousand things every day, pal. Make sure this is one of 'em.2013, Rockstar Games, Grand Theft Auto V, scene: Threatening a security officer during a bank heist, level/area: Prologue
Verb
pal (third-person singular simple present pals, present participle palling, simple past and past participle palled)
- Synonym of pal around.
- As an adult, she moved to New York and palled with trip-hop artist Tricky, who signed her to his own label.2012 November 26, Evan Schlansky, “Song Premiere: Ife Sanchez Mora, Hopeful Heart”, in American Songwriter
- There were pictures of Garcia flashing diamond mouth grills. Spewing out a Vesuvius-amount of smoke. Showing off a riot of body tattoos. Aiming guns. Palling with superstars like Lil Wayne and Chris Brown. […]2017 August 21, Kyle Swenson, “The rise and fall of Miami’s ‘CEO of Purple Drank’”, in The Washington Post
- Synonyms:
- pal around
Noun (2) capitalized: PAL
PAL (countable and uncountable, plural PALs)
- Acronym of phase alternating/alternation/alternated line (TV standard).
- Acronym of programmable array logic.
- Initialism of phenylalanine ammonia lyase.
- Acronym of permissive-action link.
- Acronym of prisoner at large.
- Acronym of peer-assisted learning.
- Abbreviation of precautionary allergen labeling.
Proper noun (1) capitalized: PAL
PAL
- Initialism of Police Athletic League.
- Initialism of Paedophile Action for Liberation.
- Acronym of Philippine Airlines, a flag carrier of the Philippines
Proper noun (2) capitalized: Pal
Pal
- A language of Papua New Guinea.
Proper noun (3) capitalized: Pal
Pal
Noun (3) capitalized: Pal
Pal (plural Pals)
- Palestinian.
- Saeb Erekat, who negotiates for Palestine, is one of the most famous Pals in the world.
Also used as
pal is also the alternative form of paul.
pal meaning in Bengali and Nepali
pal in Bengali
- পাল
pal in Nepali
- पाल
Examples of pal in a sentence
- Can I borrow an eraser? — Sorry pal, I haven't got one.
- I've been corresponding with my German pen pal for three years.
- Eat your heart out, pal! We won the title!
Synonyms of pal
Forms of pal
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | pals |
| plural | PALs |
| plural | Pals |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | pals |
| present participle | palling |
| past participle | palled |
| past | palled |
Origin of pal
PIE word *bʰréh₂tēr Borrowed from Angloromani pal (“brother, friend”), from Romani phral (“brother”), from Sanskrit भ्रातृ (bhrātṛ, “brother”). Doublet of bhai, brother, bru, frater, friar, and vai.
Words formed from pal
Phrases with pal
Words that rhyme with pal
Questions about pal
- What does pal mean?
- Pal means a friend, buddy, mate, cobber; someone to hang around with.
- What is pal in Bengali?
- Pal in Bengali is পাল. See Pal meaning in Bengali.
- What part of speech is pal?
- Pal can be a noun, a verb or a proper noun.
- How do you pronounce pal?
- Pal is pronounced /pæl/.
- What is the plural of pal?
- The plural of pal is pals.
Words near pal in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: pal (page history and authors); PAL (page history and authors); Pal (page history and authors); pal (Bengali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); pal (Nepali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). 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)-Vealhurl-pal.wav, LL-Q1860 (eng)-Wodencafe-pal.wav, En-au-Pal.ogg.
Cite this entry: “pal.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/pal. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.