walrus
noun · verb
Simple meaning
Either of two large northern marine mammals having ivory tusks and tough hide over thick blubber.
Pronunciation
Say it like this:
wawlruhsSay the bold part a little louder.
IPA pronunciation (US)
ˈwɔlɹəs
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
Either of two large northern marine mammals having ivory tusks and tough hide over thick blubber
A large Arctic marine mammal related to seals and having long tusks, tough, wrinkled skin, and four flippers, Odobenus rosmarus.
verb
To be prominent, like tusks
To move dragging one's belly along the floor
To hunt walruses
To be like a walrus
To hang like a walrus's moustache
Word at a Glance
- Difficulty
- C2 · Proficient (estimated)
- Frequency
- Uncommon
- Formality
- Technical
Word Aura™
How this word commonly comes across.
Aura for this meaning
This meaning: Either of two large northern marine mammals having ivory tusks and tough hide over thick blubber
Used this way, walrus 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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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.
A bushy droopy mustache.
A bushy droopy mustache.
A walrus of northern Atlantic and Arctic waters.
A walrus of the Bering Sea and northern Pacific.
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Words can change meaning depending on context.
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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.