Word.ws English Dictionary

tool around

tool around verb: to drive or jaunt about, going from place to place without any specific direction or goal.

Verb

tool around (third-person singular simple present tools around, present participle tooling around, simple past and past participle tooled around)

  1. (Canada, US, intransitive, transitive) To drive or jaunt about, going from place to place without any specific direction or goal.
    • Near-synonym: cruise
    • It's like when you were in high school, hanging out with your friends and tooling around in your parents' jalopy.2001 April 26, “Pay-to-play space mission”, in Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel, US, retrieved 06 Jul 2012
    Synonyms:
    cruise
  2. (idiomatic) To spend one's time idly.

Examples of tool around in a sentence

  • Many drivers tool around town or take long drives with cell phone in hand, one eye on the road but their mind clearly someplace else.2005 July 14, “Editorial: Talking heads”, in Toledo Blade, US, retrieved 06 Jul 2012:
  • Vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin is known for selling the jet her predecessor as Alaska governor used to tool around the state.2008 September 5, “Palin can't say no to jet this time”, in azcentral.com, US, retrieved 06 Jul 2012:

Synonyms of tool around

30 more synonymsFewer synonyms

Forms of tool around

third-person singular presenttools around
present participletooling around
past participletooled around
pasttooled around

Questions about tool around

What does tool around mean?
Tool around means to drive or jaunt about, going from place to place without any specific direction or goal.
How do you use tool around in a sentence?
Many drivers tool around town or take long drives with cell phone in hand, one eye on the road but their mind clearly someplace else.
What part of speech is tool around?
Tool around is a verb.
What is the past tense of tool around?
The past tense of tool around is tooled around.

Words near tool around in the dictionary

  1. tookst
  2. tookus
  3. tookuses
  4. tool
  5. tool and die
  6. tool around
  7. tool bar
  8. tool bars
  9. tool chest
  10. tool chests
  11. tool frame

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: tool around (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-au-tool around.ogg.

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