Word.ws English Dictionary

playware

playware noun: children's toys that take the form of electronic hardware or software.

Noun

playware (uncountable)

  1. children's toys that take the form of electronic hardware or software
    • This astonishing breakthrough into the previously dormant market for computer-based playware for girls ushers in a retooling of technology[…]2000, Justine Cassell, Henry Jenkins, From Barbie to Mortal Kombat: Gender and Computer Games
    • By crafting playware that not only appeals to the needs and desires of postindustrial kids but also tethers the latter to a New Age capitalist imagination, Japan is emerging as a toy maker and toy marketer of millennial times.2006, Anne Allison, Millennial Monsters: Japanese Toys and the Global Imagination

Origin of playware

From play + -ware.

Questions about playware

What does playware mean?
Playware means children's toys that take the form of electronic hardware or software.
What part of speech is playware?
Playware is a noun.

Words near playware in the dictionary

  1. playtoy
  2. playtoys
  3. playtron
  4. playtrons
  5. playward
  6. playware
  7. playwear
  8. playwork
  9. playworker
  10. playworkers
  11. playworld

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: playware (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-playware.wav.

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