Word.ws English Dictionary

rabbit

/ˈɹæbɪt/

More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations

British/ˈɹabɪt/

rabbit noun: a mammal of most genera of the family Leporidae, with long ears, long hind legs and a short, fluffy tail. (Those of the larger kind are instead called hares).

rabbit: a mammal of most genera of the family Leporidae, with long ears, long hind legs and a short, fluffy...
Image: Danni505, CC0, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

rabbit (countable and uncountable, plural rabbits)

  1. A mammal of most genera of the family Leporidae, with long ears, long hind legs and a short, fluffy tail. (Those of the larger kind are instead called hares)
    • The pioneers survived by eating the small game they could get: rabbits, squirrels and occasionally a raccoon.
    • Orion hit a rabbit once; but though sore wounded it got to the bury, and, struggling in, the arrow caught the side of the hole and was drawn out. Indeed, a nail filed sharp is not of much avail as an arrowhead; you must have it barbed, and that was a little beyond our skill.1879, R[ichard] J[efferies], “The Old Punt: A Curious ‘Turnpike’”, in The Amateur Poacher, London: Smith, Elder, & Co., […], →OCLC, pages 19–20
  2. (uncountable) The meat from this animal.
    • She was cooking rabbit stew for dinner.
  3. (uncountable) The fur of a rabbit typically used to imitate another animal's fur.
  4. A runner in a distance race whose goal is mainly to set the pace, either to tire a specific rival so that a teammate can win or to help another break a record; a pacesetter.
  5. A very poor batsman, selected as a bowler or wicket-keeper.
    Synonyms:
    walking wicket
  6. A batsman who is frequently dismissed by the same bowler (said to be that player's rabbit).
    • Glenn McGrath dismissed Michael Atherton a record 19 times; hence Atherton is McGrath's rabbit.
    Synonyms:
    bunny
  7. A large element at the beginning of a list of items to be bubble sorted, and thus tending to be quickly swapped into its correct position. Compare turtle.
  8. Rarebit; Welsh rabbit or a similar dish: melted cheese served atop toast.
    • The cheese mixture may be served with toast on the side or poured on top of toast and grilled until golden brown and bubbling. Other variations include Buck rabbit, a Welsh rabbit with a poached egg on top, and Yorkshire rabbit with bacon ...2018, Helen Saberi, Teatimes: A World Tour, Reaktion Books, →ISBN
    • CHEESE TOASTED, OR RABBIT.1858, Mrs. N. K. M. Lee, The American Family Cook Book, page 47
  9. A pneumatically-controlled tool used to insert small samples of material inside the core of a nuclear reactor.
    • This rabbit is constructed such that only that fraction of the beam that passes through the 15g-in. diameter target container reaches the Faraday cup behind the rabbit.2012, Joseph Cerny, Nuclear Spectroscopy and Reactions 40-A (part 1, page 249)
  10. (genericized trademark) A vibrator with a shaft and a clitoral stimulator usually shaped like a rabbit's ears.
    • Rabbits come in many forms/In colors, shapes and sizes./ They satisfy a lady's needs,/Indulging her sweet vices.2013 07, larry morgan, FOOTSTEPS: Poetic Reflections on the Opposite Sex and Life's Other Contradictions., iUniverse, →ISBN, page 37
    • First, she showed us the standard dildos before moving on to the rabbits—vibrators with little ears to stimulate the clit.2018 August 29, Vivienne Savage, A Man of Many Talons, Payne & Taylor

Verb (1)

rabbit (third-person singular simple present rabbits, present participle rabbiting or rabbitting, simple past and past participle rabbited or rabbitted)

  1. (intransitive) To hunt rabbits.
  2. (US, intransitive) To flee.
    • The informant seemed skittish, as if he was about to rabbit.
    • When the three friends heard someone behind them yell, "police, freeze!" they each rabbited in a different direction.
    Synonyms:
    run off, scamper, bolt

Verb (2)

rabbit (third-person singular simple present rabbits, present participle rabbiting, simple past and past participle rabbited)

  1. (UK, intransitive) To talk incessantly and in a childish manner; to babble annoyingly.
    • Stop your infernal rabbiting! Use proper words or nobody will listen to you!
    • Ah start tae feel her up, while rabbitin a load ay shite ahoot how we huv tae stick thegither at a time like this.1993, Irvine Welsh, Trainspotting, Times Film School, page 90

Verb (3)

rabbit

  1. Confound; damn; drat.
    • LORD D. There, Dick, d'ye hear how the tutorer talks? oh rabbit it! he can ladle you out of latin by the quart;—and grunts greek like a pig.1797, George Colman, The Heir at Law

Proper noun capitalized: Rabbit

Rabbit

  1. The fourth of the twelve-year cycle of animals which appear in the Chinese zodiac related to the Chinese calendar.

rabbit meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu

rabbit in Hindi

mammal
ख़रगोश xargoś, खरगोश khargoś, शशक śaśak, सुस्सा sussā, खरहा kharhā

rabbit in Tamil

mammal
முயல் muyal

rabbit in Marathi

mammal
ससा sasā, सशी saśī

rabbit in Urdu

mammal
خَرْگوش xargoś, شَشَک śaśak, سُسّا sussā
More languagesFewer languages
rabbit in Bengali
খরগোশ khorgōś, শশ śoś
rabbit in Telugu
కుందేలు kundēlu
rabbit in Malayalam
മുയല് muyal
rabbit in Kannada
ಮೊಲ mola
rabbit in Punjabi
ਖ਼ਰਗੋਸ਼ xargoś
rabbit in Gujarati
સસલું saslũ
rabbit in Odia
ଠେକୁଆ ṭhekuā
rabbit in Sanskrit
शशक śaśaka, शश śaśa
rabbit in Sinhala
රට හාවෝ raṭa hāwō
rabbit in Assamese
শহা xoha, শহাপহু xohapohu
rabbit in Nepali
खरायो kharāyo
rabbit in Pashto
سوۍ saway
rabbit in Tagalog
kuneho, buot, dagang-taingahan
rabbit in Arabic
أَرْنَب ʔarnab
rabbit in Malay
arnab, kelinci, kucing belanda, kuilu
rabbit in Indonesian
kelinci
rabbit in Thai
กระต่าย grà-dtàai
rabbit in Vietnamese
thỏ
rabbit in Myanmar
ယုန် yun
Kashmiri
خَرگوش khargōś
Dzongkha
རི་བོང ri bong

Examples of rabbit in a sentence

  • Hannah Glasse offered recipes for Scotch, Welsh, and English rabbit.2019, Mark Kurlansky, Milk: A 10,000-Year History, Bloomsbury Publishing, →ISBN:
  • She reached into her night stand for some lubricant and her rabbit vibrator.2023 June 6, Madeline Cox, 250 Sexy Erotic Stories: Age Gap, Taboo Dark Reverse Harem, Forbidden Naughty Family, Tales for Adults, BDSM...
  • He said the attack on him could have been prevented if another man who was in front of him prior to the attack hadn't "rabbitted out of there."1986 December 7, Kim Westheimer, “Gay Bashing Still a Popular Boston Sport”, in Gay Community News, volume 14, number 21, page 3:

All 40 example sentences with rabbit

Synonyms of rabbit

2 more synonymsFewer synonyms

All synonyms of rabbit

Forms of rabbit

Noun
pluralrabbits
Verb
third-person singular presentrabbits
present participlerabbiting
present participlerabbitting
past participlerabbited
pastrabbited
past participlerabbitted
pastrabbitted

Plural of rabbit: rabbits

Origin of rabbit

Inherited from Middle English rabet, rabette, from Anglo-Latin rabettus, from dialectal Old French rabotte, probably a diminutive of Middle Dutch or West Flemish robbe (“rabbit, seal”), of uncertain origin; possibly some imitative verb, maybe robben, rubben (“to rub”) is used here to allude to a characteristic of the animal. See rub. Related forms include Middle French rabouillet (“baby rabbit”) and in French rabot (“plane”)), coming via Walloon Old French (reflected nowadays as Walloon robète (“rabbit”)), from Middle Dutch robbe ("rabbit; seal"; whence Modern Dutch rob (“rabbit", also "seal”)); also Middle Low German robbe, rubbe (“rabbit”), and the later German Low German Rubbe, Robb (“seal”), West Frisian robbe (“seal”), Saterland Frisian Rubbe (“seal”), North Frisian rob (“seal”), borrowed into German Robbe (“seal”). Meant "young rabbit" until the 19th c., when it came to replace the original general term cony, owing to the latter's resemblance to and use as a euphemism for cunny, "vulva" (compare ass and donkey). Note that there is no inherited Germanic word for rabbits, since hares are the only leporids native to Britain (as with all of Europe outside the Iberian Peninsula...

From Cockney rhyming slang rabbit and pork, to talk.

Perhaps a corruption of rabate.

Words formed from rabbit

Phrases with rabbit

54 more phrasesFewer phrases

Words that rhyme with rabbit

Questions about rabbit

What does rabbit mean?
Rabbit means a mammal of most genera of the family Leporidae, with long ears, long hind legs and a short, fluffy tail. (Those of the larger kind are instead called hares).
What is rabbit in Hindi?
Rabbit in Hindi is ख़रगोश (xargoś), खरगोश (khargoś), शशक (śaśak). See Rabbit meaning in Hindi.
How do you use rabbit in a sentence?
Hannah Glasse offered recipes for Scotch, Welsh, and English rabbit.
What part of speech is rabbit?
Rabbit can be a noun, a verb or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce rabbit?
Rabbit is pronounced /ˈɹæbɪt/ (UK).
What is the plural of rabbit?
The plural of rabbit is rabbits.

Words near rabbit in the dictionary

  1. rabbinizing
  2. rabbins
  3. rabbis
  4. rabbiship
  5. rabbiships
  6. rabbit
  7. rabbit ball
  8. rabbit balls
  9. rabbit bandicoot
  10. rabbit bandicoots
  11. rabbit board

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: rabbit (page history and authors); Rabbit (page history and authors); ଠେକୁଆ (Odia) (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-uk-a rabbit.ogg, en-us-rabbit.ogg, en-au-rabbit.ogg.

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