Link Centre Dictionary

wide

US/waɪd/ common slang uk
adjective (8) adverb (4)

adjective

1.

having great (or a certain) extent from one side to the other

  • “wide roads”
  • “a wide necktie”
  • “wide margins”
  • “three feet wide”
  • “a river two miles broad”
  • “broad shoulders”
  • “a broad river”
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2.

broad in scope or content

  • “across-the-board pay increases”
  • “an all-embracing definition”
  • “blanket sanctions against human-rights violators”
  • “an invention with broad applications”
  • “a panoptic study of Soviet nationality” T.G.Winner
  • “granted him wide powers”
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3.

(used of eyes) fully open or extended

  • “listened in round-eyed wonder”
  • “stared with wide eyes”
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4.

very large in expanse or scope

  • “a broad lawn”
  • “the wide plains”
  • “a spacious view”
  • “spacious skies”
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5.

great in degree

  • “won by a wide margin”
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6.

great in range or scope

  • “an extended vocabulary”
  • “surgeons with extended experience”
  • “extensive examples of picture writing”
  • “suffered extensive damage”
  • “a wide selection”
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7.

having ample fabric

  • “the current taste for wide trousers”
  • “a full skirt”
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8.

not on target

  • “the kick was wide”
  • “the arrow was wide of the mark”
  • “a claim that was wide of the truth”
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adverb

1.

with or by a broad space

  • “stand with legs wide apart”
  • “ran wide around left end”
2.

to the fullest extent possible

  • “open your eyes wide”
  • “with the throttle wide open”
3.

far from the intended target

  • “the arrow went wide of the mark”
  • “a bullet went astray and killed a bystander”
Synonyms
4.

to or over a great extent or range; far

  • “wandered wide through many lands”
  • “he traveled widely”
Synonyms

Origin

PIE word *dwóh₁ From Middle English wid, wyd, from Old English wīd (“wide, vast, broad, long; distant, far”), from Proto-Germanic *wīdaz, from Proto-Indo-European *h₁weydʰh₁- (“to divide, separate”), a dissimilated univerbation from *dwi- (“apart, asunder, in two”) + *dʰeh₁- (“to do, put, place”). Cognates Cognate with North Frisian widj (“wide”), Saterland Frisian wied (“wide”), West Frisian wiid (“broad; wide”), Central Franconian weck, weit, wick, wiet (“distant, far, wide”), Dutch wijd (“wide; large; broad”), German weit (“far; wide; broad”), Luxembourgish weit (“wide”), wäit (“far”), Yiddish ווײַט (vayt, “distant, far”), Danish, Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk, and Swedish vid (“wide”), Faroese and Icelandic víður (“wide”); also Breton gwez (“trees”), Cornish gwedh, gwëdh, gwydh, gwÿdh (“trees”), Irish and Scottish Gaelic fiodh (“timber, wood”), Manx fuygh (“timber, wood”), Welsh gwŷdd (“trees”), Latin dīvidō (“to divide, separate”), Latgalian vyds (“middle”), Latvian vidus (“center, middle”), Lithuanian vidùs (“interior, inside; inward”), Tocharian A and Tocharian B wätk- (“to distinguish, separate”). Related to widow.

Phrases

  • a mile wide and an inch deep
  • all wool and a yard wide
  • blow wide open
  • by a wide margin
  • cast one's net far and wide
  • cast one's net wide
  • cut a wide swath
  • cut a wide swathe

Related words

Word family

See also

WordNet 2.1 (Princeton University). Wiktionary (CC BY-SA). CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. WordNet 2.1 Copyright Princeton University. All rights reserved. Wiktionary content is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike Licence.