VocabauraVOCABAURA

wolf

noun · verb

Simple meaning

Canis lupus; the largest wild member of the canine subfamily.

Pronunciation

Say it like this:

wuulf
US device voice
IPA pronunciation (US)

ˈwʊlf

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. countable

    Canis lupus; the largest wild member of the canine subfamily.

  2. A man who is aggressive in making amorous advances to women

  3. A man who makes amorous advances to many women.

  4. One of the destructive, and usually hairy, larvae of several species of beetles and grain moths.

  5. figurative

    Any very ravenous, rapacious, or destructive person or thing; especially, want; starvation.

  6. A cruelly rapacious person

verb

  1. transitive

    To devour; to gobble; to eat (something) voraciously.

  2. intransitive

    To hunt for wolves.

  3. intransitiveslang

    To make amorous advances to many women; to hit on women; to cruise for sex.

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: Canis lupus; the largest wild member of the canine subfamily.

Used this way, wolf 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 wolf

  • “The teenager wolfed down the pizza.”verb

Share your sentence

Write your own example sentence using “wolf”. We review each one before it appears.

Common Patterns and Combinations

How this word naturally appears with others.

White

gray wolf

Various

wolf pack

Other combinations

red wolfwolf creekbad wolf

Tap the highlighted word to open its own entry.

Word Family

Related forms, grouped by how they connect.

Compound terms

Established multiword terms.

  • wolf spidernounCompound term

    Ground spider that hunts its prey instead of using a web.

  • wolf-whistleverbCompound term

    Whistle or howl approvingly at a female, of males.

  • wolf pupnounCompound term

    A young wolf.

  • wolf packnounCompound term

    A group of submarines operating together in attacking enemy convoys.

  • wolf fishnounCompound term

    Large ferocious northern deep-sea food fishes with strong teeth and no pelvic fins.

  • wolf downverbCompound term

    Eat hastily.

Use This Word

See how this word sounds in a real sentence.

Ask Vocabaura

Understand the word your way.

What Does It Mean Here?

Words can change meaning depending on context.

Use it yourself

Knowing “wolf” starts when you use it. Pick a next step, all free.

Know the meaning? Practice using it in a real situation, free, no credits.

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.