Word.ws English Dictionary

small

/smɔl/

More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations

cot caught merger/smɑl/

small adjective: not large or big; insignificant; few in number.

Adjective

small (comparative smaller, superlative smallest)

  1. Not large or big; insignificant; few in number.
    • A small serving of ice cream.
    • A small group.
    1. Humiliated or insignificant.
      • The bullies had succeeded in making him feel small.
      • For all the times that you made me feel small / I fell in love, now I feel nothing at all2015, Justin Bieber, Love Yourself
    2. Having a small penis, muscles, or other important body parts, regardless of overall body size.
      • (of genitals)
      • Though over six feet tall, the man was very small and ashamed to undress.
  2. (figuratively, not comparable) Young, as a child.
    • Remember when the children were small?
    Synonyms:
    little, wee, young
    Antonyms:
    adult, grown-up, old
  3. (not comparable) Minuscule or lowercase, referring to written or printed letters.
    • "I've got catholic tastes. Catholic with a small "c", of course."1959, Anthony Burgess, Beds in the East (The Malayan Trilogy), published 1972, page 584
    Synonyms:
    lowercase, minuscule
  4. Evincing little worth or ability; not large-minded; paltry; mean.
    • A true delineation of the smallest man is capable of interesting the greatest man.1851, Thomas Carlyle, The Life of John Sterling
  5. Not prolonged in duration; not extended in time; short.
    • a small space of time
  6. Synonym of little (“of an industry or institution(s) therein: operating on a small scale, unlike larger counterparts”).
    • small science
    Synonyms:
    little
  7. (archaic) Slender, gracefully slim.
  8. (especially, food or drink) That is small (the manufactured size).
    • I'll have a small coffee, thanks.

Adverb

small (comparative smaller, superlative smallest)

  1. In a small fashion
    • Don't write very small!
  2. In or into small pieces.
    • That's going to go in there. We've got some chives small chopped as well.2009, Ingrid Hoffman, CBS Early Morning for September 28, 2009 (transcription)
  3. (obsolete) To a small extent.
    • It small avails my mood.1594, William Shakespeare, Lucrece (First Quarto), London: […] Richard Field, for Iohn Harrison, […], →OCLC, line 1273
  4. (obsolete) In a low tone; softly.
    • That's all one: you shall play it in a mask, and / you may speak as small as you will.c. 1595–1596 (date written), William Shakespeare, “A Midsommer Nights Dreame”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First...

Noun

small (countable and uncountable, plural smalls)

  1. (especially, noun-from-verb, uncountable, food or drink) One of several common sizes to which an item may be manufactured, smaller than a medium.
    Synonyms:
    S
  2. (countable, especially, noun-from-verb, food or drink) An item labelled or denoted as being that size.
    • Two smalls and a large, please.
  3. (countable, especially, noun-from-verb) One who fits an item of that size.
  4. (countable, noun-from-verb, rare) Any part of something that is smaller or slimmer than the rest, now usually with anatomical reference to the back.
    • I got a splitting pain in the small of my back

Verb

small (third-person singular simple present smalls, present participle smalling, simple past and past participle smalled)

  1. (noun-from-verb, obsolete, transitive) To make little or less.
  2. (intransitive, noun-from-verb) To become small; to dwindle.
    • And smalled till she was nought at all.1917, Thomas Hardy, The Clock of the Years

Proper noun capitalized: Small

Small (plural Smalls)

  1. A surname.
    • “People have biases towards species that are glamorous,” said Dr. Ernie Small, author of the study and taxonomist for Agriculture Canada.2012 May 6, Eoghan Macguire, “Beauty trumps beast in conservation efforts”, in CNN

small meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu

small in Hindi

not large
छोटा choṭā, क्षुद्र kṣudra, छोट choṭ, नन्हा nanhā, सगीर sagīr
young
नन्हा nanhā, जवान javān, सगीर sagīr

small in Tamil

not large
சிறிய் ciṟiy, சிறிய ciṟiya, சின்ன ciṉṉa
young
இளைய iḷaiya
minuscule or lowercase, referring to written letters
சிறிய ciṟiya

small in Marathi

not large
छोटा choṭā, छोटी choṭī, छोटे choṭe, लहान lahān
young
लहान lahān

small in Urdu

not large
چھوٹا choṭā
More languagesFewer languages
small in Bengali
ছোট chōṭ
small in Telugu
చిన్న cinna
small in Malayalam
ചെറിയ ceṟiya, കുഞ്ഞ് kuññŭ
small in Kannada
ಚಿಕ್ಕ cikka
small in Punjabi
ਛੋੱਟਾ choṭṭā
small in Gujarati
નાનું nānũ
small in Odia
ଛୋଟ choṭa, କ୍ଷୁଦ୍ର kṣudra
small in Sanskrit
अर्भ arbha, अल्प álpa, स्वल्प svalpa
small in Sinhala
කුඩා kuḍā
small in Assamese
সৰু xoru
small in Nepali
सानो sāno, छोटो choṭo
small in Pashto
وړوکی waṛukay, کوچنی kučnay
small in Tagalog
maliit
small in Arabic
صَغِير ṣaḡīr, صغير ṣuḡayyar, زغير zḡīr
small in Malay
kecil
small in Indonesian
kecil
small in Persian
کوچَک kučak, خُرْد xord, کِهْ keh, سوتام sutâm
small in Thai
เล็ก lék
small in Vietnamese
nhỏ, bé
small in Myanmar
သေး se:, နုပ် nup
Sindhi
نَنڍو nãḍho
Kashmiri
لۄکُٹ lọkuṭ, نیُٛک, خۄرٕد khọrụd, پیٛوٗنٛت pyūnt

Examples of small in a sentence

  • Piling debt onto companies’ balance-sheets is only a small part of what leveraged buy-outs are about, they insist.2013 June 22, “Engineers of a different kind”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8841, archived from the original on 25 Nov 2020, page...
  • The orbiter has been observing the moon since 2009, and its reflector is a smaller version of reflector panels placed on the lunar surface during the Apollo 11, 14 and 15 landings on the moon.2020 August 13, Ashley Strickland, “The reason we’re shooting laser beams between Earth and the moon”, in CNN:
  • Guinness World Record confirmed the micro-cube as the world’s smallest rotating puzzle cube in August.2024 October 4, Chris Lau and Nodoka Katsura, “This is the world’s smallest Rubik’s Cube. And it actually works”, in CNN:

All 40 example sentences with small

Synonyms of small

17 more synonymsFewer synonyms

Antonyms

10 more antonymsFewer antonyms

All synonyms and antonyms of small

Forms of small

Adjective
comparativesmaller
superlativesmallest
Adverb
comparativesmaller
superlativesmallest
Noun
pluralsmalls
Verb
third-person singular presentsmalls
present participlesmalling
past participlesmalled
pastsmalled
Proper noun
pluralSmalls
alternative formSmale
alternative formSmales
alternative formSmalles
alternative formSmalls

Plural of small: smalls

Origin of small

From Middle English smal, smale, small, smalle, smel, smæl, from Old English smæl (“narrow, slim; slender; fine; small; quiet”), from Proto-West Germanic *smal, from Proto-Germanic *smalaz (“small”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)mal- (“small; little”). Cognates Cognate with Scots smaw (“small; minor”), Yola smaale, small (“small”), North Frisian smaal, smeel, smääl (“narrow”), Saterland Frisian smäl (“narrow”), West Frisian smel (“narrow”), Alemannic German schmaal (“narrow”), Bavarian schmoi (“narrow; slender”), Dutch smal (“narrow; small”), German schmal (“narrow; slender”), Low German small (“narrow; slender, small”), Luxembourgish schmuel (“narrow”), Vilamovian śmoł, šmoł (“narrow”), Yiddish שמאָל (shmol, “narrow”), Danish, Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk, and Swedish smal (“narrow; slim”), Gothic 𐍃𐌼𐌰𐌻𐌹𐍃𐍄𐍃 (smalists, “smallest”); also Latin malus (“bad, distressing, nasty; evil, mischievous, wicked; destructive, hurtful, noxious; abusive, hostile, unkind”), Belarusian малы́ (malý, “small”), Bulgarian and Macedonian мал (mal, “small; minor”), Czech and Slovak malý (“small”), Polish mały (“small; little; humble; short”), Russian ма́лый (mályj, “small; short”), Serbo-Croatian...

Inherited from Old English smæl (“small”). Compare Smail. First attested in the 1200s.

Words formed from small

Phrases with small

151 more phrasesFewer phrases

Words that rhyme with small

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about small

What does small mean?
Small means not large or big; insignificant; few in number.
What is small in Hindi?
Small in Hindi is छोटा (choṭā), क्षुद्र (kṣudra), छोट (choṭ). See Small meaning in Hindi.
How do you use small in a sentence?
Piling debt onto companies’ balance-sheets is only a small part of what leveraged buy-outs are about, they insist.
What part of speech is small?
Small can be an adjective, an adverb, a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce small?
Small is pronounced /smɔl/.

Words near small in the dictionary

  1. smalahove
  2. Smale
  3. Smale's paradox
  4. Smales
  5. Smalininkai
  6. small
  7. small "c" conservative
  8. small "c" conservatives
  9. small "d" democrat
  10. small "d" democrats
  11. small "l" liberal

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: small (page history and authors); Small (page history and authors); छोटो (Nepali) (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-small.ogg, en-us-small.ogg.

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