Word.ws English Dictionary

recoilless

recoilless adjective: lacking recoil. Generally referring to a weapon so designed as to fire a projectile without causing a powerful, destructive backward "kick" or recoil in reaction. The objective of the design is to permit a very light cannon to deliver a relatively large projectile.

recoilless: lacking recoil. Generally referring to a weapon so designed as to fire a projectile without causing...
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Adjective

recoilless (comparative more recoilless, superlative most recoilless)

  1. Lacking recoil. Generally referring to a weapon so designed as to fire a projectile without causing a powerful, destructive backward "kick" or recoil in reaction. The objective of the design is to permit a very light cannon to deliver a relatively large projectile.
    • The author can attest that when the 57mm, 90mm, and 84mm recoilless rifles are fired from the shoulder there is no recoil.The firer is buffeted by the high pressure of the muzzle and back blasts, some of it being reflected off the ground.2013, Gordon L. Rottman, The Big Book of Gun Trivia, Bloomsbury Publishing, →ISBN

Forms of recoilless

comparativemore recoilless
superlativemost recoilless

Origin of recoilless

From recoil + -less.

Words formed from recoilless

Phrases with recoilless

Questions about recoilless

What does recoilless mean?
Recoilless means lacking recoil. Generally referring to a weapon so designed as to fire a projectile without causing a powerful, destructive backward "kick" or recoil in reaction. The objective of the design is to permit a very light cannon to deliver a relatively large projectile.
What part of speech is recoilless?
Recoilless is an adjective.

Words near recoilless in the dictionary

  1. recoiler
  2. recoilers
  3. recoiling
  4. recoilingly
  5. recoilings
  6. recoilless
  7. recoilless nuclear resonance fluorescence
  8. recoilless rifle
  9. recoilless rifles
  10. recoillessly
  11. recoillessness

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: recoilless (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.

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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-us-recoilless.oga.

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