Word.ws English Dictionary

pool

/puːl/

More pronunciations (2)Fewer pronunciations

British/pʉwl/

pool noun: a small and rather deep area of (usually) fresh water, as one supplied by a spring, or occurring in the course of a stream or river; a reservoir for water. Also the ellipsis of swimming pool.

pool: a small and rather deep area of (usually) fresh water, as one supplied by a spring, or occurring in...
Image: CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun (1)

pool (plural pools)

  1. A small and rather deep area of (usually) fresh water, as one supplied by a spring, or occurring in the course of a stream or river; a reservoir for water.
    • the pools of Solomon
    • the Pool of London
  2. Any small body of standing or stagnant water; a puddle.
  3. (broadly) A set of resources that are kept ready to use.
  4. (broadly) Any group of like things.
  5. A small amount of liquid on a surface.
    • a pool of blood
  6. A localized glow of light.
    • He walked slowly, passing through one pool of light after another, his shadow running tall across the fronts of the barber shop, the Western Auto, the video-rental shop.1991, Stephen King, Needful Things

Verb (1)

pool (third-person singular simple present pools, present participle pooling, simple past and past participle pooled)

  1. (intransitive) To form a pool.

Noun (2)

pool (plural pools)

  1. A supply of resources.
    • The 4-BEP and 4-CEP stock is maintained in a common pool for both Chatham and South Eastern fast main-line services.1962 June, Rupert Shervington, “The planning and execution of the Kent Coast electrification”, in Modern Railways, page 390
    1. A number of people when considered as a resource.
      • dating pool
      • There is a limited pool of candidates from which to choose the new manager.
  2. (uncountable) A game at billiards, in which each of the players stakes a certain sum, the winner taking the whole; also, in public billiard rooms, a game in which the loser pays the entrance fee for all who engage in the game.
  3. A cue sport played on a pool table. There are 15 balls, 7 of one colour or solids, 7 of another color or stripes, and the black ball (also called the 8 ball). A player must pocket all their own colour balls and then the black ball in order to win.
    • He plays pool at the billiard-houses, and may be seen engaged at cards and dominoes of forenoons.1848, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 23, in The Book of Snobs
  4. In rifle shooting, a contest in which each competitor pays a certain sum for every shot he makes, the net proceeds being divided among the winners.
  5. A group of fencers taking part in a competition.
    Synonyms:
    poule
  6. (rugby union) A set of teams playing each other in the same division, while not during the same period playing any teams that belong to other sets in the division.
    Synonyms:
    group
  7. Any gambling or commercial venture in which several persons join.
  8. The stake played for in certain games of cards, billiards, etc.; an aggregated stake to which each player has contributed a share; also, the receptacle for the stakes.
  9. A combination of persons contributing money to be used for the purpose of increasing or depressing the market price of stocks, grain, or other commodities; also, the aggregate of the sums so contributed.
    • The pool took all the wheat offered below the limit.
    • He put $10,000 into the pool.
  10. A set of players in quadrille etc.
  11. A mutual arrangement between competing lines, by which the receipts of all are aggregated, and then distributed pro rata according to agreement.
  12. An aggregation of properties or rights, belonging to different people in a community, in a common fund, to be charged with common liabilities.

Verb (2)

pool (third-person singular simple present pools, present participle pooling, simple past and past participle pooled)

  1. (transitive) To put together; contribute to a common fund, on the basis of a mutual division of profits or losses; to make a common interest of.
    • We must pool our resources.
    • “She must be exceedingly clever to have beaten the police the way she has for the last few years; and—er—I worship at the shrine of cleverness—especially if it be a woman’s. The idea struck me last night that if she and I should—er—pool our resources, we should not have to complain of the...1920, Frank L. Packard, chapter 4, in The White Moll
  2. (intransitive) To combine or contribute with others, as for a commercial, speculative, or gambling transaction.

Proper noun capitalized: Pool

Pool

  1. A village in Carn Brea parish, Cornwall, England (OS grid ref SW6641).
  2. (abbreviation, ellipsis) Ellipsis of Pool-in-Wharfedale.
  3. A civil parish in the Metropolitan Borough of Leeds, West Yorkshire, England, also known as Pool in Wharfedale.
  4. An unincorporated community in Nicholas County, West Virginia, United States.
  5. A department of the Republic of the Congo.

Also used as

pool is also the ellipsis of swimming pool.

pool meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu

pool in Hindi

पूल

pool in Tamil

body of water
குளம் kuḷam
small body of standing or stagnant water; a puddle
குட்டை kuṭṭai

pool in Marathi

पूलिंग करण्यासाठी

pool in Urdu

تالاب, پول
More languagesFewer languages
pool in Bengali
পুল
pool in Telugu
పూల్, కొలను, పూల్ చెయ్యడానికి
pool in Malayalam
കുളം
pool in Kannada
ಪೂಲ್
pool in Punjabi
ਪੂਲ, ਪੂਲ ਕਰਨ ਲਈ
pool in Gujarati
પૂલ, પૂલ કરવા
pool in Odia
ପୁଲ୍
pool in Sanskrit
सरस् saras
pool in Assamese
ডোঙা düṅa
pool in Nepali
पूल, पूल गर्न
pool in Tagalog
dagat-dagatan
pool in Arabic
بِرْكَة birka
pool in Malay
kolam, perkhidmatan, tabung
pool in Indonesian
kolam, genangan, kumpulan, pangkalan
pool in Persian
برکه berke, مخزن
pool in Thai
สระน้ำ sà-náam
pool in Vietnamese
bể, vũng, bi-a

Examples of pool in a sentence

  • A Single Life doth well with Church-men : For Charitie will hardly water the Ground, where it muſt firſt fill a Poole.1625, Francis [Bacon], “Of Marriage And Single Life. VIII.”, in The Essayes […], 3rd edition, London: […] Iohn Haviland for Hanna Barret...
  • Wagner, Ph.D., chatted at an office get-together. […] From this conversation, the two decided to pool their knowledge and join forces.2007 November, Elizabeth Drake, “Combine and conquer: Use these winning food pairings to protect your health”, in Men's Health, volume 22...

All 40 example sentences with pool

Synonyms of pool

Forms of pool

Noun
pluralpools
alternative form (obsolete)poole
Verb
third-person singular presentpools
present participlepooling
past participlepooled
pastpooled

Past tense of pool: pooled

Plural of pool: pools

Origin of pool

From Middle English pool, pole, pol, from Old English pōl (“pool”), from Proto-West Germanic pōl, from Proto-Germanic *pōlaz (“pool, pond”), from Proto-Indo-European *bōlos (“bog, marsh”). Cognate with Scots puil (“pool”), Saterland Frisian Pol (“pool”), West Frisian poel (“pool”), Dutch poel (“pool”), German Low German Pohl, Pool, Pul (“pool”), German Pfuhl (“quagmire, mudhole”), Danish pøl (“puddle”), Swedish pöl (“puddle, pool”), Icelandic pollur (“puddle”), Lithuanian bala (“puddle”), Latvian bala (“a muddly, treeless depression”), Russian боло́то (bolóto, “swamp, bog, marsh”). For the meaning development to a supply of resources compare typologically Russian пруд пруди́ (prud prudí) (< пруд (prud)).

1. From French poule (“collective stakes in a game”). The French word "poule" in this context is an abbreviation of "poulain, pouliche" (foal, filly), and referred to races with female horses under 3 years old. It then became used by punters to designate bets on that race, and started to be used from the racetrack to the stadiums. 2. The OED suggests that this may be a transferred use of poule (“hen”), which has been explained anecdotally as deriving from an old informal betting game in France - 'jeu de poule' - Game of Chicken (or Hen, literally) in which poule became synonymous with the combined money pot claimed by the winner.

In all likelihood from the noun pool.

Words formed from pool

Phrases with pool

50 more phrasesFewer phrases

Words that rhyme with pool

42 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about pool

What does pool mean?
Pool means a small and rather deep area of (usually) fresh water, as one supplied by a spring, or occurring in the course of a stream or river; a reservoir for water.
What is pool in Hindi?
Pool in Hindi is पूल. See Pool meaning in Hindi.
How do you use pool in a sentence?
A Single Life doth well with Church-men : For Charitie will hardly water the Ground, where it muſt firſt fill a Poole.
What part of speech is pool?
Pool can be a noun, a verb or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce pool?
Pool is pronounced /puːl/ (UK).
What is the plural of pool?
The plural of pool is pools.

Words near pool in the dictionary

  1. pookie bears
  2. pookies
  3. pookoo
  4. pookoos
  5. Pooky
  6. pool
  7. pool at the crook
  8. pool boy
  9. pool boys
  10. pool chair
  11. pool chairs

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: pool (page history and authors); Pool (page history and authors); pool (Hindi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); pool (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); pool (Urdu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); pool (Bengali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); pool (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); pool (Malayalam, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); pool (Kannada, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); pool (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); pool (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); pool (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); pool (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.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-pool.wav, LL-Q7976 (mis)-Le Rêveur0316-pool.wav.

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