shells
noun · verb
Form of shell , plural of shell.
Simple meaning
The material that forms the hard outer covering of many animals.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
shehlzIPA pronunciation (US)
ˈʃɛlz
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
plural of shell
The material that forms the hard outer covering of many animals
plural of shell
A hard external covering of an animal.
plural of shell
Hard outer covering or case of certain organisms such as arthropods and turtles
plural of shell
The conjoined scutes that constitute the "shell" (carapace) of a tortoise or turtle.
verb
third-person singular of shell
To cast the shell, or exterior covering; to fall out of the pod or husk.
third-person singular of shell
Remove from its shell or outer covering
third-person singular of shell
To fall off, as a shell, crust, etc.
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: The material that forms the hard outer covering of many animals
Used this way, shells 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.
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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.