Word.ws English Dictionary

welly

/ˈwɛli/

welly noun: a Wellington boot.

Noun

welly (countable and uncountable, plural wellies)

  1. (countable, informal) A Wellington boot.
    • Dad has great big welly boots. For squishing in the mud; Two great big black welly boots: Thud, thud, thud.2009, Verse for Ages
  2. (informal, uncountable) Force on a pedal or increase to any fuel or power for an engine or motor.
  3. (informal, uncountable) Force or effort.
    • Come on! Put some welly into it!
    Synonyms:
    back, elbow grease

Adverb (1)

welly (not comparable)

  1. (Ireland, UK, dialectal, obsolete) Almost; nearly.
    • A person exceedingly hungry says, "I'm welly clem'd; I'm almost or well-nigh starved." It is the ordinary appeal of a beggar in the streets, when asking for food.1853, Notes & Queries, volume 8, page 64

Adverb (2)

welly (not comparable)

  1. Very.
    • The real thrill comes to the investigator when, convinced that he is no mere casual diner, the waiter grins broadly and says, "You don't worry. I get you something welly nice."1928 October 13, The Argus, Melbourne, page 2, column 7

Proper noun capitalized: Welly

Welly

  1. (New Zealand, informal) Wellington, New Zealand

Synonyms of welly

Forms of welly

pluralwellies
alternative formwellie

Origin of welly

Clipping of Wellington boot + -y.

From welne, a dialectal variant of well-nigh.

Clipping of Wellington + -y (diminutive suffix).

Words formed from welly

Phrases with welly

Words that rhyme with welly

15 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about welly

What does welly mean?
Welly means a Wellington boot.
What part of speech is welly?
Welly can be a noun, an adverb or a proper noun.
How do you pronounce welly?
Welly is pronounced /ˈwɛli/.
What is the plural of welly?
The plural of welly is wellies.

Words near welly in the dictionary

  1. wellwisher
  2. wellwishers
  3. wellwishes
  4. wellwishing
  5. wellwishings
  6. welly
  7. welly it
  8. welly wanging
  9. welly whanging
  10. wellyard
  11. wellyards

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: welly (page history and authors); Welly (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: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-welly.wav.

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