scuff
/skʌf/
More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations
Australia/skɐf/
scuff verb: to scrape the feet while walking.
Verb
scuff (third-person singular simple present scuffs, present participle scuffing, simple past and past participle scuffed)
- To scrape the feet while walking.
- To scrape and roughen the surface of (shoes, etc.)
- To hit lightly, to brush against.
- The lawns and gardens had been scuffed away.1979, V. S. Naipaul, A Bend in the River
- Wallace threw himself at it to connect with a flying header. He looked a certain scorer but his effort scuffed the inside of Fraser Forster’s post.2011 December 29, Keith Jackson, “SPL: Celtic 1 Rangers 0”, in Daily Record
- To mishit (a shot on a ball) due to poor contact with the ball.
- The Montenegro captain was finding space at will and followed up with a speculative shot that he scuffed wide, after Wales were slow in closing down the Juventus striker.2011 September 2, “Wales 2-1 Montenegro”, in BBC
- Synonym of scrub in (“To break in new racing tires by doing a few gentle laps on them, with the resulting heat serving to remove factory coatings and provide better grip.”)
- Synonyms:
- scrub in
Noun (1)
scuff (plural scuffs)
- A mark left by scuffing or scraping.
- Someone left scuff marks in the sand.
- He flung his shoes across the room, their soles leaving black scuffs on the dingy wall.2015, Charles W. Jones, Hydrangeas on the Lanai
- The sound of a scuff or scrape.
- All you could hear was the rhythmic scuff of Mr. Stink’s battered brogues as he walked slowly along the road2009 October 29, David Walliams [pseudonym; David Edward Williams], Mr Stink, London: HarperCollins Children’s Books, →ISBN
- A slipper.
- A (sudden) shower of rain or mist.
- It was a dark, gloomy day, with black clouds driven by the wind, and scuffs of grey showers scudding among the hilltops. Presently lying couched amid the heather we saw the dragoons come marching loosely two and two,[…]1895, Samuel Rutherford Crockett, The Men of the Moss-hags: Being a History of Adventure Taken from the Papers of William Gordon of Earlstoun in Galloway and, page 313
- and when I got [to] the shoulder of the Craig yonder, cold scuffs of mist were reaching down from higher up, that told me how my view was to be spoiled, and warned me to mind my path. But I knew the heights; many a time have I been caught in the descending clouds, and a mist was like an old friend.1902, Nicholas Dickson, William Sanderson, The Border Magazine: An Illustrated Monthly, page 159
Noun (2)
scuff (plural scuffs)
- A scurf; a scale.
- The back part of the neck; the scruff.
- One of the biggest and most redoubted of the Black Family was now in that seat of dignity, and, refusing surlily to yield it at Jasper's rude summons, was seized by the scuff of the neck, and literally hurled on the table in front.1858, Edward Bulwer-Lytton, What Will He Do with It?
scuff meaning in Malayalam
scuff in Malayalam
- scratch, scrape, rub
- തേച്ചുരയ്ക്കുക, ചീകുക, ചീവുക, ചുരണ്ടുക, പരണ്ടുക, ഉരുമ്മുക
Examples of scuff in a sentence
- I scuffed my shoe on the door.
- I bought a scuffed skateboard from a second-hand store.
- Sure the others had a couple scuff marks, but he got the worst of it with all the bruises.
Synonyms of scuff
Forms of scuff
| Verb | |
|---|---|
| third-person singular present | scuffs |
| present participle | scuffing |
| past participle | scuffed |
| past | scuffed |
| Noun | |
| plural | scuffs |
Origin of scuff
From Scots scuff (“to touch lightly, graze, hit”), of obscure origin. Perhaps from Old Norse skúfa (“to shove, push aside”), from Proto-Germanic *skeubaną (“to shove”). Or, perhaps imitative. More at shove.
See scuft
Words formed from scuff
Phrases with scuff
Words that rhyme with scuff
Questions about scuff
- What does scuff mean?
- Scuff means to scrape the feet while walking.
- What is scuff in Malayalam?
- Scuff in Malayalam is തേച്ചുരയ്ക്കുക, ചീകുക, ചീവുക. See Scuff meaning in Malayalam.
- What part of speech is scuff?
- Scuff can be a verb or a noun.
- How do you pronounce scuff?
- Scuff is pronounced /skʌf/ (UK).
- What is the past tense of scuff?
- The past tense of scuff is scuffed.
Words near scuff in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: scuff (page history and authors); scuff (Olam, E.K. Kurup corpus) (dataset 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.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-scuff.wav.
Cite this entry: “scuff.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/scuff. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.