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span

noun · verb

Simple meaning

Any of different traditional units of length approximating this distance.

Pronunciation

Say it like this:

span
US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

ˈspæn

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. Wingspan of a plane or bird

  2. Any of various traditional units of length approximating this distance, especially the English handspan of 9 inches forming ⅛ fathom and equivalent to 22.86 cm.

  3. uscanada

    A pair of horses or other animals driven together; usually, such a pair of horses when similar in color, form, and action.

  4. by extension

    A small space or a brief portion of time.

  5. A portion of something by length; a subsequence.

  6. Acronym of Suicide Prevention Advocacy Network.

verb

  1. transitive

    To measure by the span of the hand with the fingers extended, or with the fingers encompassing the object.

  2. transitive

    To extend through the distance between or across.

  3. transitive

    To extend through (a time period).

  4. To cover or extend over an area or time period

  5. transitive

    To fetter, as a horse; to hobble.

Word at a Glance

Difficulty
B1 · Intermediate
Frequency
Common
Typical Use
Everyday English

Word Aura™

How this word commonly comes across.

Aura for this meaning

This meaning: Any of various traditional units of length approximating this distance, especially the English handspan of 9 inches forming ⅛ fathom and equivalent to 22.86 cm.

Used this way, span 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 span

  • “The job was finished in the span of an hour.”noun

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Common Patterns and Combinations

How this word naturally appears with others.

life spanattention spanmemory spanshort spanyear spandigit spanlong spanbrief span

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Word Family

Related forms, grouped by how they connect.

Inflected forms

Grammatical variations of the same word.

  • spannernounInflected form

    A hand tool that is used to hold or twist a nut or bolt.

Word family

Words built from the same root.

  • spanishnounDerived noun

    The Romance language spoken in most of Spain and the countries colonized by Spain.

Compound terms

Established multiword terms.

  • span loadingnounCompound term

    The ratio of the weight of an airplane to its wingspan.

More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin

Synonyms

Sense: to measure by the span of the hand with the fingers extended

bridge

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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.