suck
verb · noun
Simple meaning
To use the mouth and lips to pull in.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
suhkIPA pronunciation (US)
ˈsʌk
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.
verb
transitive
To use the mouth and lips to pull in (a liquid, especially milk from the breast).
transitive
To put the mouth or lips to (a breast, a mother etc.) to draw in milk.
transitive
To work the lips and tongue on (an object) to extract moisture or nourishment; to absorb (something) in the mouth.
intransitive
To perform such an action; to feed from a breast or teat.
Draw into the mouth by creating a practical vacuum in the mouth
transitive
To extract, draw in (a substance) from or out of something.
noun
An instance of drawing something into one's mouth by inhaling.
An indrawing of gas or liquid caused by suction.
uncountable
Milk drawn from the breast.
canada
A weak, self-pitying person; a person who refuses to go along with others, especially out of spite; a crybaby or sore loser.
A sycophant, especially a child.
A part of a river towards which strong currents converge making navigation difficult.
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: To use the mouth and lips to pull in (a liquid, especially milk from the breast).
Used this way, suck is a reasonably familiar word with a clearly unfavourable pull. It usually sounds natural in a wide range of settings.
- Emotional tone
- Negative
- Formality
- Neutral
- Intensity
- Gentle
- How common
- Moderately common
- Connotation
- Serious and weighty
- 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 suck
- “The current boom in the economy sucked many workers in from abroad.”verb
- “Suck the poison from the place where the snake bit.”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.
Inflected forms
Grammatical variations of the same word.
The act of sucking.
A person who is gullible and easy to take advantage of.
Compound terms
Established multiword terms.
Take up as if with a sponge.
Marine fishes with a flattened elongated body and a sucking disk on the head for attaching to large fish or moving objects.
Wingless usually flattened bloodsucking insect parasitic on warm-blooded animals.
An unweaned piglet.
Remove by suction.
Take in, also metaphorically.
Related words
Connected by subject or meaning, not by word formation.
Reflex behavior in newborn mammals.
More about this wordSynonyms, forms, origin
Synonyms
Sense: to use the mouth and lips to pull in (a liquid
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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.