Word.ws English Dictionary

panting

/ˈpæntɪŋ/

panting is the present participle and gerund of pant.

Meaning of pant

Verb

pant (third-person singular simple present pants, present participle panting, simple past and past participle panted)

  1. (ambitransitive) To breathe quickly or in a labored manner, as after exertion or from eagerness or excitement; to respire with heaving of the breast; to gasp.
    • Pluto pants for breath from out his cell.1697, Virgil, “(please specify the book number)”, in John Dryden, transl., The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC
    Synonyms:
    gasp
  2. (intransitive) To long eagerly; to desire earnestly.
    • As the hart panteth after the water brooks.1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Psalms 42:1
    Synonyms:
    crave, desire, long, pine
  3. (obsolete, transitive) To long for (something); to be eager for (something).
    • Then shall our hearts pant thee.1633, George Herbert, Love
    Synonyms:
    crave, desire, long for, pine for
  4. (intransitive) Of the heart, to beat with unnatural violence or rapidity; to palpitate.
    • Yet might her piteous heart be seen to pant and quake1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto VII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC
    Synonyms:
    palpitate, pound, throb
  5. (intransitive) To sigh; to flutter; to languish.
    • [T]he whiſp'ring Breeze / Pants on the Leaves, and dies upon the Trees.1709 May, Alexander Pope, “Pastorals. The Fourth Pastoral, or Daphne. […]”, in Poetical Miscellanies: The Sixth Part. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC, page 750
  6. (intransitive) To heave, as the breast.

See all 26 meanings of pant

Noun

panting (plural pantings)

  1. The act of one who pants.
    • Now here, now there, moved by the straggling wind, / Came ever and anon a breathlike sound, / Quick as the pantings of the faithful dog […]1850, William Wordsworth, The Prelude

Proper noun capitalized: Panting

Panting

  1. A surname.

Forms of panting

pluralpantings

Words formed from panting

Words that rhyme with panting

Questions about panting

What does panting mean?
Panting means the act of one who pants.
What is panting the present participle and gerund of?
Panting is the present participle and gerund of pant.
What part of speech is panting?
Panting can be a noun or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce panting?
Panting is pronounced /ˈpæntɪŋ/.
What is the plural of panting?
The plural of panting is pantings.

Words near panting in the dictionary

  1. pantilettes
  2. pantiliner
  3. pantiliners
  4. pantiling
  5. pantin
  6. panting
  7. pantingly
  8. pantings
  9. pantisocracies
  10. pantisocracy
  11. pantisocrasies

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: panting (page history and authors); Panting (page history and authors); pant (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-panting.ogg.

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