swim
UK/swɪm/
More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations
South Asia/sʋɪm/
swim verb: to move through the water, without touching the bottom; to propel oneself in water by natural means. Also the abbreviation of someone who isn't me.
Verb (1)
swim (third-person singular simple present swims, present participle swimming, simple past swam or (archaic) swum, past participle swum)
- To move through the water, without touching the bottom; to propel oneself in water by natural means.
- We were now all upon a Level, as to our travelling; being unshipp’d, for our Bark would swim no farther, and she was too heavy to carry on our Backs […]1720, Daniel Defoe, Captain Singleton, London: J. Brotherton, page 87
- He turned back to the scene before him and the enormous new block of council dwellings. The design was some way after Corbusier but the block was built up on plinths and resembled an Atlantic liner swimming diagonally across the site.1963, Margery Allingham, “Foreword”, in The China Governess: A Mystery, London: Chatto & Windus, →OCLC
- To become immersed in, or as if in, or flooded with, or as if with, a liquid.
- swimming in self-pity
- a bare few bits of meat swimming in watery sauce
- To move around freely because of excess space.
- A fam'd Sur-tout he wears, which once was blue,
And his foot swims in a capacious shoe.1777, The Poetical Preceptor; Or, a Collection of Select Pieces of Poetry, Etc
- A fam'd Sur-tout he wears, which once was blue,
- To traverse (a specific body of water, or a specific distance) by swimming; or, to use a specific swimming stroke; or, to compete in a specific swimming event.
- For exercise, we like to swim laps around the pool.
- I want to swim the 200-yard breaststroke in the finals.
- To cause to swim.
- to swim a horse across a river
- Half of the guinea pigs were swum daily.
- To float.
- sink or swim
- There's oil swimming on the water.
- To be overflowed or drenched.
- I am weary with my groaning; all the night make I my bed to swim; I water my couch with my tears.1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Psalms 6:6
- Sudden, the ditches ſwell; the meadows ſwim.a. 1749 (date written), James Thomson, “Autumn”, in The Seasons, London: […] A[ndrew] Millar, and sold by Thomas Cadell, […], published 1768, →OCLC, page 127, line 336
- To immerse in water to make the lighter parts float.
- to swim wheat in order to select seed
- To test (a suspected witch) by throwing into a river; those who floated rather than sinking were deemed to be witches.
- To glide along with a waving motion.
- To have a great quantity of something.
- You should be swimming in money after this job.
Noun (1)
swim (plural swims)
- An act or instance of swimming.
- I'm going for a swim.
- She had a quick swim in the bay.
- The sound, or air bladder, of a fish.
- A part of a stream much frequented by fish.
- A dance or dance move of the 1960s in which the arms are moved in imitation of various swimming strokes, such as freestyle, breaststroke, etc.
- C'mon everybody! C'mon in!
Bobby's goin' to show you how to do the swim.1964, “C'mon and Swim”, Thomas Coman and Sylvester Stewart (Sly Stone) (lyrics), performed by Bobby Freeman
- C'mon everybody! C'mon in!
- The flow of events; being in the swim of things.
- With the road ahead now clear, Mann […] is plunging back into the swim of business in a hurry.1948 September 18, Billboard, page 104
Noun (2)
swim (plural swims)
Verb (2)
swim (third-person singular simple present swims, present participle swimming, simple past swam or (archaic) swum, past participle swum)
- To be dizzy or vertiginous; have a giddy sensation; to have, or appear to have, a whirling motion.
- My head was swimming after drinking two bottles of cheap wine.
- She snatched the letter from Sir Jasper, who started as her icy hand touched his: she attempted to read the passage herself, but the letters seemed to swim before her gaze: they turned to fire; the paper dropped from her grasp; a thick mist appeared to gather over the room; she gave a convulsive...1837, L[etitia] E[lizabeth] L[andon], “The End of Doubt”, in Ethel Churchill: Or, The Two Brides. […], volume I, London: Henry Colburn, […], →OCLC, page 291
Pronoun capitalized: SWIM
SWIM (third-person singular)
- Someone who isn't me; someone who isn't myself
- SWIM would like to know how to grow marijuana.
Proper noun capitalized: Swim
Swim (plural Swims)
- A surname.
Also used as
swim is also the abbreviation of someone who isn't me.
swim meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu
swim in Hindi
- move through water
- तैरना tairnā
- act or instance of swimming
- तैरना tairnā, तैराकी tairākī
swim in Tamil
- move through water
- நீந்து nīntu
swim in Marathi
- move through water
- पोहणे pohṇe
swim in Urdu
- move through water
- تیرنا tairnā
More languagesFewer languages
- swim in Bengali
- সাঁতার śãtar
- swim in Telugu
- ఈదు īdu, ఈత īta
- swim in Malayalam
- നീന്തുക nīntuka, നീന്തൽ nīntal
- swim in Kannada
- ಈಜಲು, ಈಜು ಮಾಡಲು
- swim in Punjabi
- ਤੈਰਾਕੀ ਕਰੋ, ਤੈਰਾਕੀ ਕਰਨ ਲਈ
- swim in Gujarati
- તરવા
- swim in Odia
- ପହଁରା pahãrā
- swim in Sanskrit
- प्लवते plavate
- swim in Sinhala
- පිහිනනවා pihinanawā
- swim in Assamese
- সাঁতোৰ xãtür
- swim in Nepali
- पौडिनु pauḍinu
- swim in Pashto
- لامبل lambə́l
- swim in Tagalog
- lumangoy, languyin
- swim in Arabic
- سَبَحَ sabaḥa, سَبْحَة sabḥa, سِبَاحَة sibāḥa
- swim in Indonesian
- berenang
- swim in Persian
- شنا کردن šenâ kardan, شناویدن šenâvidan, شناییدن, شنا šenâ
- swim in Thai
- ว่ายน้ำ wâai-náam, ว่าย wâai
- swim in Vietnamese
- bơi, tắm
- swim in Myanmar
- ရေကူး reku:
- Sindhi
- ترڻ trṇ
Examples of swim in a sentence
- Meanwhile, NR faced an unexpected challenge when a night watchman spotted several Koi Carp swimming in floodwater close to the railway, after they had escaped from a nearby private residence.2020 May 20, Paul Stephen, “NR beats floods to secure tracks to Drax”, in Rail, page 59:
- Sometimes he thought to swim the stormy main.1697, Virgil, “The Tenth Book of the Æneis”, in John Dryden, transl., The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis....
- And he cut down a stick, and cast it in thither; and the iron did swim.1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, 2 Kings 6:6:
Forms of swim
| Verb | |
|---|---|
| third-person singular present | swims |
| present participle | swimming |
| past | swam |
| past participle | swum |
| past (archaic) | swum |
| second-person singular past (archaic) | swammest |
| present participle (archaic) | swimmand |
| past participle (archaic) | swum |
| Noun | |
| plural | swims |
| Proper noun | |
| plural | Swims |
| alternative form | Swims |
Origin of swim
From Middle English swymmen, from Old English swimman (“to swim, float”) (class III strong verb; past tense swamm, past participle geswummen), from Proto-West Germanic *swimman, from Proto-Germanic *swimmaną (“to swim”), from Proto-Indo-European *swem(bʰ)- (“to be unsteady, move, swim”). Cognates Cognate with North Frisian sweem, swome, swume, swumi, swumme, swääm (“to swim”), Saterland Frisian and West Frisian swimme (“to swim”), Dutch zwemmen (“to swim”), German schwimmen (“to swim”), Limburgish schwämme, zwömme (“to swim”), Low German swimmen (“to swim”), Luxembourgish schwammen (“to swim”), Vilamovian švymma, śwyma, śwymma (“to swim”), Yiddish שווימען (shvimen, “to swim”), Danish and Norwegian Bokmål svømme (“to swim”), Faroese svimja (“to swim”), Norn suma (“to swim”), Norwegian Nynorsk svemja, svemje, svømma, svømme, symja, symje (“to swim”), Swedish simma (“to swim”).
From Middle English swime, sweme, swaime (“a dizziness, swoon, trance”), from Old English swīma (“a swoon, swimming in the head”). Cognate with Swedish svimma (“to swoon, faint”) and Danish svime (“to swoon, faint”) / Danish besvime (“to swoon, faint”).
Abbreviation of someone who isn't me.
Words formed from swim
- aswim
- can a duck swim
- do fish swim
- faster than a minnow can swim a dipper
- I can't swim
- outswim
- overswim
- quicker than a minnow can swim a dipper
- reswim
- sink or swim
- swimfant
- swim like a fish
- swimmability
- swimmable
- swimmer
- swimmist
- swimmy
- swimnastic
- swimnastics
- swimsuit
- swim the Thames
- swim the Tiber
- swim upstream
- swim with sharks
- upswim
- in the swim
- in the swim of things
- midswim
- polar bear swim
- postswim
- preswim
- swimathon
- swimbait
- swim bladder
- swim brief
- swim briefs
- swimcap
- swim cap
- swim diaper
- swimfin
- swim fin
- swim-in
- swim lane
- swimline
- swimmate
- swim meet
- swim nappy
- swim-off
- swim platform
- swim ring
- swimrun
- swimshirt
- swimshorts
- swim trunks
- swimway
- swimwear
- wim nappy
Phrases with swim
Words that rhyme with swim
Questions about swim
- What does swim mean?
- Swim means to move through the water, without touching the bottom; to propel oneself in water by natural means.
- What is swim in Hindi?
- Swim in Hindi is तैरना (tairnā), तैराकी (tairākī). See Swim meaning in Hindi.
- How do you use swim in a sentence?
- Meanwhile, NR faced an unexpected challenge when a night watchman spotted several Koi Carp swimming in floodwater close to the railway, after they had escaped from a nearby private residence.
- What part of speech is swim?
- Swim can be a verb, a noun, a pronoun or a proper noun.
- How do you pronounce swim?
- Swim is pronounced /swɪm/ (UK).
- What is the past tense of swim?
- The past tense of swim is swam.
Words near swim in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: swim (page history and authors); SWIM (page history and authors); Swim (page history and authors); swim (Kannada, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); swim (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); swim (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model 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: en-us-swim.ogg.
Cite this entry: “swim.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/swim. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.