aground
Americanadverb
adverb
Etymology
Origin of aground
Explanation
Aground describes a boat that's accidentally gone ashore, or is stuck on the bottom of a lake or other body of water. If your kayak goes aground, you may need to get out and push it further out in the bay. When you use the word aground, you're almost certainly talking about a boat or ship. If a sailboat runs aground, its hull can be damaged, which might even cause the boat to take on water. Running aground can be a minor inconvenience, or a major accident. Since about 1500, the adjective aground has been a nautical term that generally means "stranded on land."
Vocabulary lists containing aground
Red Kayak
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Tristan Strong Punches a Hole in the Sky
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The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The boat, carrying 82 people, ran aground on a beach in northern France on Sunday morning.
From BBC • May 3, 2026
Then she wrote a pilot for a different series with Olivia Colman, but it too ran aground.
From The Wall Street Journal • Mar. 30, 2026
What’s Next: As late as last month lawmakers seemed poised to move forward with the bill, however the Senate’s version of it ran aground.
From Barron's • Feb. 20, 2026
She co-founded a school for orphans, preserved and sold Hamilton’s papers, and commissioned a biographical project that kept running aground.
From The Wall Street Journal • Nov. 21, 2025
The punt would not have left the bank or, if it had, would have run aground or been fouled by weeds or some other obstruction.
From "Watership Down: A Novel" by Richard Adams
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
