paw
noun · verb
Simple meaning
The soft foot of a mammal or other animal, generally a quadruped, that has claws or nails.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
pawIPA pronunciation (US)
ˈpɔ
This word is pronounced essentially the same in American and British English, so one transcription covers both.
IPA (International Phonetic Alphabet) is a standard way of writing speech sounds.
Definition
Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.
noun
The soft foot of a mammal or other animal, generally a quadruped, that has claws or nails; comparable to a human hand or foot.
verb
Touch clumsily
“The man tried to paw her.”
transitive
Of an animal, to draw the forefoot along the ground; to beat or scrape with the forefoot.
Scrape with the paws
transitive
Of an animal, to dig through (something, such as a garbage can) with paws.
transitiveby extension
To touch (someone) in a sexual way.
transitiveby extension
To clumsily dig (through something).
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- B2 · Upper Intermediate (estimated)
- Frequency
- Moderately Common
- Formality
- Technical
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: The soft foot of a mammal or other animal, generally a quadruped, that has claws or nails; comparable to a human hand or foot.
Used this way, paw is a specialist word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It turns up most in technical or specialist writing contexts.
- Emotional tone
- Neutral
- Formality
- Specialist/technical
- Intensity
- Not strongly marked
- How common
- Specialized
- Connotation
- Clinical and technical
- Usage feel
- Technical and specialized
Where it naturally appears
- Technical/specialist writing
Usage note
In general conversation this sense usually needs explaining — outside its field, people reach for a plainer word.
Nearby words
- manus , more formal, and heavier in everyday conversation
Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.
More ways to use paw
- “The man tried to paw her.”verb
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Common Patterns and Combinations
How this word naturally appears with others.
Word Family
Related forms, grouped by how they connect.
Compound terms
Established multiword terms.
Pink clusters of densely packed flowers on prostrate stems resemble upturned pads of cats' feet.
Almond-flavored yeast-raised pastry shaped in an irregular semicircle resembling a bear's claw.
A person used by another to gain an end.
Sedgelike spring-flowering herb having clustered flowers covered with woolly hairs.
Sedgelike spring-flowering herb having clustered flowers covered with woolly hairs.
Epiphytic fern with large fronds.
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Dictionary data from Wiktionary via the Free Dictionary API. Simple meanings, combinations and word intelligence are built from verified reference data, no AI is used to load this page.