Word.ws English Dictionary

presto

/ˈpɹɛstəʊ/US/ˈpɹɛstoʊ/

presto adverb: very fast or quickly; a directive for the musician(s) to play in a very quick tempo.

Adverb

presto (not comparable)

  1. Very fast or quickly; a directive for the musician(s) to play in a very quick tempo.

Interjection

  1. Used by magicians when performing a trick; ta-da; voilà.
    • So I put my hand into the hat and presto! Out comes a rabbit!
    • You know the old man's ivory leg, well I dreamed he kicked me with it ; and when I tried to kick back, upon my soul, my little man, I kicked my leg right off! And then, presto! Ahab seemed a pyramid, and I, like a blazing fool, kept kicking at it.1851 November 14, Herman Melville, chapter 31, in Moby-Dick; or, The Whale, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers; London: Richard Bentley, →OCLC, page 142

Noun

presto (uncountable)

  1. (slang) A pair of fives as a starting hand in Texas hold 'em.

Proper noun capitalized: Presto

Presto (plural Prestos)

  1. A surname.

presto meaning in Tamil and Kannada

presto in Tamil

விதையியக்கம்

presto in Kannada

ವೇಗವಾಗಿ, ಚುರುಕಾಗಿ, ಅತಿದ್ರುತವಾಗಿ

Synonyms of presto

All synonyms of presto

Forms of presto

pluralPrestos

Origin of presto

From Italian presto (“quickly”).

Words formed from presto

Phrases with presto

Words that rhyme with presto

Questions about presto

What does presto mean?
Presto means very fast or quickly; a directive for the musician(s) to play in a very quick tempo.
What is presto in Tamil?
Presto in Tamil is விதையியக்கம். See Presto meaning in Tamil.
What part of speech is presto?
Presto can be an adverb, an interjection, a noun or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce presto?
Presto is pronounced /ˈpɹɛstəʊ/ (UK).

Words near presto in the dictionary

  1. presting
  2. prestins
  3. Prestis
  4. prestissimo
  5. prestitial
  6. presto
  7. presto change-o
  8. presto changeo
  9. presto chango
  10. prestomal
  11. Preston

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: presto (page history and authors); Presto (page history and authors); presto (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); presto (Kannada Wiktionary) (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-presto.wav.

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