zot

zot verb: to zap, kill, or destroy.

Verb

zot (third-person singular simple present zots, present participle zotting, simple past and past participle zotted)

(slang, transitive) To zap, kill, or destroy.
- I reached for the handle and it zotted me — an electric shock to the elbow.1980, Kit Reed, Magic time
- I've heard rumors about the oracle zotting people and I have these questions about zot?1997, Matt Lepinski, “Zotting”, in rec.humor.oracle.d (Usenet)

Noun (1)

zot (plural zots)

(US, slang) An anteater.

Interjection

(US) The characteristic sound made by an anteater's tongue or by lightning.

Noun (2)

zot (plural zots)

(South Africa, Zimbabwe, derogatory, ethnic, offensive, slur) A black person.
- Regretfully there is nothing that can be done about things .. just a time bomb ticking, ticking, ticking .. until one day soon, the zots will decide to take a property here, and a property there (they have after all started with vacant land and been successful), so why not progress to property?2000 April 9, Squirrel, “SA Silence on Mugabe's actions”, in soc.culture.south-africa (Usenet)
- (SA) ¶ The government has TACITLY condoned the actions of the zots by allowing them to continue their illegal occupation.
  (Zimbabwe) ¶ The government condoned the illegal activities and progressed to the point where they were actively supporting it.2000 October 29, Nude Raider, “Here are the facts...”, in soc.culture.south-africa (Usenet)
Synonyms:

BIPOC, BME, colored, colored person, minority, nonwhite, person of color

Noun (3) capitalized: Zot

Zot (uncountable)

(abbreviation, acronym) Acronym of zonula occludens toxin, a secretion of Vibrio cholerae.

Examples of zot in a sentence

When a taxi driver, convenience store clerk, pizza deliverer, etc., gets zotted, it is on the back page of the local newspaper and not in out of town newspapers at all.1997, Terry Moore, “COPS PUT LIVES ON LINE?”, in austin.general (Usenet):
electric fence - zotting me was fine (well really!) but they were worried about zotting the several dozen human puppies that hang around at our house.1998, RosieDawg, “watergardening and dogs and Rosie's new toy, OT-ish”, in rec.ponds (Usenet):
The zots will destroy the barns, the homesteads, the tractors, everything - reducing them to their component parts without the aid of explosives.2002 July 5, Alistair, “Re: Tobacco barn and other assets- disassembly instructions”, in soc.culture.zimbabwe (Usenet):

Synonyms of zot

BIPOC
BME
colored
minority
nonwhite
person of color
colored person

Forms of zot

Verb
third-person singular present	zots
present participle	zotting
past participle	zotted
past	zotted
Noun
plural	zots

Origin of zot

A sound effect. Popularized by the Usenet Oracle, a humorous Internet advice service, where the word was used as an irritated dismissal of a question.

Sound effect in the comic strip B.C., first published in 1958, associated with both (1) the rapid tongue of an anteater character and (2) lightning bolts.

Questions about zot

What does zot mean?: Zot means to zap, kill, or destroy.
How do you use zot in a sentence?: When a taxi driver, convenience store clerk, pizza deliverer, etc., gets zotted, it is on the back page of the local newspaper and not in out of town newspapers at all.
What part of speech is zot?: Zot can be a verb, a noun or an interjection.
What is the past tense of zot?: The past tense of zot is zotted.

Words near zot in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: zot (page history and authors); Zot (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: 2026-09-02

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-zot.ogg.

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