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ranch

noun · verb

Simple meaning

A large plot of land used for raising cattle, sheep or other livestock.

Pronunciation

Say it like this:

ranch
US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

ˈɹæntʃ

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.

Word Review

Definition

Everyday modern meanings first, grouped by part of speech.

noun

  1. A large plot of land used for raising cattle, sheep or other livestock.

  2. A small farm that cultivates vegetables or livestock, especially one in the Southwestern United States.

  3. Farm consisting of a large tract of land along with facilities needed to raise livestock (especially cattle)

  4. A house or property on a plot of ranch land.

  5. uncountable

    Ranch dressing.

verb

  1. Manage or run a ranch

    “Her husband is ranching in Arizona.”

  2. transitiveintransitive

    To operate a ranch; to engage in ranching.

  3. transitiveintransitive

    To work on a ranch.

Word at a Glance

Difficulty
A2 · Elementary (estimated)
Frequency
Common
Typical Use
General English

Word Aura™

How this word commonly comes across.

Aura for this meaning

This meaning: A large plot of land used for raising cattle, sheep or other livestock.

Used this way, ranch is a reasonably familiar word that usually carries little praise or criticism of its own. It usually sounds natural in a wide range of settings.

Emotional tone
Neutral
Formality
Neutral
Intensity
Not strongly marked
How common
Moderately common
Connotation
Matter-of-fact
Usage feel
Neutral and straightforward

Word Aura describes common impressions, not a measurement. Tone changes with sentence, speaker, relationship and situation.

More ways to use ranch

  • “Her husband is ranching in Arizona.”verb

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Common Patterns and Combinations

How this word naturally appears with others.

Large / farm

ranch housecattle ranch

Other combinations

dude ranchranch handguest ranchking ranchranch lifecreek ranch

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Word Family

Related forms, grouped by how they connect.

Inflected forms

Grammatical variations of the same word.

  • ranchernounInflected form

    A person who owns or operates a ranch.

  • ranchingnounInflected form

    Farming for the raising of livestock (particularly cattle).

Compound terms

Established multiword terms.

  • ranch handnounCompound term

    A hired hand on a ranch.

  • ranch housenounCompound term

    A one story house with a low pitched roof.

Related Words

Connected to the same idea, not synonyms.

More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin

Synonyms

Sense: large plot of land used for raising cattle

spread

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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.