banana
Americannoun
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bananas
plural
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a tropical plant of the genus Musa, certain species of which are cultivated for their nutritious fruit.
-
the fruit, especially that of M. paradisiaca, with yellow or reddish rind.
noun
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any of several tropical and subtropical herbaceous treelike plants of the musaceous genus Musa , esp M. sapientum , a widely cultivated species propagated from suckers and having hanging clusters of edible fruit
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the crescent-shaped fruit of any of these plants Compare plantain 2
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of banana
1590–1600; < Spanish < Portuguese (perhaps via Sp); akin to various words for banana or plantain in WAfr languages (e.g., Wolof, Malinke banana, Vai (Mande language of Liberia) bana ), but ultimate source and direction of borrowing uncertain
Explanation
A banana is a curved, yellow fruit with a thick skin and soft sweet flesh. If you eat a banana every day for breakfast, your roommate might nickname you "the monkey." A banana is a tropical fruit that's quite popular all over the world. It grows in bunches on a banana tree. To "go bananas" is a slangy way of saying "go crazy" or act ridiculous, and if someone refers to the "top banana," they mean the most important person in a particular group. The origin of banana isn't certain, but it's thought that it was borrowed by the Spanish or Portuguese from an African word, probably the Wolof word banana.
Vocabulary lists containing banana
Yellow
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Spelling Practice 2, Unit 7
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Example Sentences
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See Examples For:
Once a small-bore banana republic marked by political instability, its weak institutions, rampant corruption and attractive location made it a target for gangsters looking to create a transit hub.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 11, 2026
A while back, for instance, Friday Ashlie decided Monday Ashlie would make banana leaf-wrapped fish.
From Salon ● Sep. 14, 2026
Right now it’s banana ice cream with blueberries and it’s heaven.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 4, 2026
For farmers, dry soils have disrupted the growth of fruit and cacao trees as well as banana and coffee plants, contributing to crop losses.
From Science Daily ● Sep. 4, 2026
But first I turn over in my mind which snack I should mention—peanut butter banana or tomato soup.
From "Muffled" by Jennifer Gennari
First up, hosts Felix Salmon, Emily Peck, and Elizabeth Spiers dig into what is causing inflation and why bananas should actually cost more than they do.
From Slate ● Oct. 17, 2026
"Before the ube craze, it was a niche market," he said, adding it had lagged behind high-value crops like bananas, mangoes and coffee.
From Barron's ● Oct. 6, 2026
And then one day, when I had a bunch of almost-rotten bananas sitting on my kitchen counter, I threw them together and made a cake.
From Salon ● Sep. 26, 2026
Photographs and videos widely shared online show the young apes sitting together on the forest floor and eating bananas, thousands of kilometres from the tropical rainforests where they belong.
From BBC ● Sep. 9, 2026
He finally drank a glass of milk and ate cottage cheese with bananas.
From "Breaking Through" by Francisco Jiménez
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