Word.ws English Dictionary

pootle

/ˈpuːtəl/

pootle noun: a stroll; a wandering.

Noun

pootle (plural pootles)

  1. (UK) A stroll; a wandering.
    • go for a pootle

Verb

pootle (third-person singular simple present pootles, present participle pootling, simple past and past participle pootled)

  1. (UK, informal) To wander or ramble in a leisurely, indirect, or aimless manner, such as by walking or driving.
    • Prince William, in a surprise break from the schedule, borrowed his father's 41-year-old open-topped Aston Martin to pootle down the Mall to Clarence House with his new bride.2011 April 30, Stephen Bates, “Prince William takes new wife for a spin in father's Aston Martin”, in The Guardian, →ISSN
    • You turn up every morning for the ‘ward round’, where your whole team of doctors pootles past each of their patients.2017, Adam Kay, This Is Going to Hurt: Secret Diaries of a Junior Doctor
    Synonyms:
    ramble, wander, potter

Synonyms of pootle

Forms of pootle

Noun
pluralpootles
Verb
third-person singular presentpootles
present participlepootling
past participlepootled
pastpootled

Origin of pootle

Apparently an alteration of poodle, from German Low German Pudel, from the onomatopoeic term pudeln (“to splash about”) by its merging with tootle. Alternatively, a blending of doodle (to draw aimlessly) with potter (to move aimlessly)—as reported by 1970s English visitors to Australia.

Words formed from pootle

Words that rhyme with pootle

Questions about pootle

What does pootle mean?
Pootle means a stroll; a wandering.
What part of speech is pootle?
Pootle can be a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce pootle?
Pootle is pronounced /ˈpuːtəl/ (UK).
What is the plural of pootle?
The plural of pootle is pootles.

Words near pootle in the dictionary

  1. Pootilla
  2. Pootin
  3. pooting
  4. pootis
  5. pootises
  6. pootle
  7. pootle along
  8. pootled
  9. pootled along
  10. pootles
  11. pootles along

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: pootle (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)-Vealhurl-pootle.wav.

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