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Synonyms

blob

American  
[blob] / blɒb /

noun

  • blobs
    plural
  1. a globule of liquid; bubble.

  2. a small lump, drop, splotch, or daub.

    A blob of paint marred the surface.

  3. an object, especially a large one, having no distinct shape or definition.

    a blob on the horizon.

  4. a dull, slow-witted, and uninteresting person.


verb (used with object)

blobbed, blobbing
  1. to mark or splotch with blobs.

blob British  
/ blɒb /

noun

  1. a soft mass or drop, as of some viscous liquid

  2. a spot, dab, or blotch of colour, ink, etc

  3. a indistinct or shapeless form or object

  4. a slang word for condom

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

verb

  1. (tr) to put blobs, as of ink or paint, on

"Collins English Dictionary — Complete & Unabridged" 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

Inflected Forms

Nouns


Etymology

Origin of blob

1400–50; late Middle English; apparently expressive formation


Explanation

A blob is a spot, drop, or a shapeless mass of something, You can't just put blobs of paint on your canvas and call it art! Blob is often used interchangeably with glob or drop. You might top your apple pie with blobs of whipped cream, or put a blob of toothpaste on your toothbrush. And if your map appears to be just blobs of color, you might want to put your glasses on and look again. Blob first appeared as a verb in the 15th century, meaning "to mark with drops or granules," a close relation of bubble.

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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.

See Examples For:

Within minutes, sunlight transforms this material into an ionized gas shield that slows the oncoming massive blob of plasma.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 10, 2026

"That cold isn't a kind of a get-out-of-jail-free card in terms of global warming. Some of the hot extremes can actually be exacerbated by this cold blob in the Atlantic," McCarthy said.

From Barron's ● Jun. 26, 2026

That had to be a whiff of flop-sweat from the Atlanta 1996 games’ blue blob mascot, something like an anthropomorphized teardrop, originally named Whatizit for the obvious reaction it generated, and later just Izzy.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 6, 2026

The company says the avatar, called Mico and resembling a blob with a smiley face, is "not a mascot, but an optional visual identity for Copilot".

From BBC ● May 13, 2026

With an allergy to abstraction and a phobia of cliche, Wilkerson trains a magnifying glass on the historical blob called “the Great Migration” and reveals the humanity of the people who compose it.

From "The Sense of Style" by Steven Pinker

Seen with the naked eye from the stern of our 40-foot tour boat, the dark blobs bobbing in the restless sea didn’t look like much.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 26, 2026

“It’s like this that humanism itself gets swallowed up by nihilism,” he adds, concretizing that image in his movie with many scenes of environmental degradation realized as crawling blobs of death.

From Salon ● Jul. 22, 2026

She makes a "smoothie" out of her fluffy yellow cream, rubbing blobs on the back of her hand and mixing it with a tinted moisturiser.

From BBC ● Jun. 6, 2026

This idea describes how hot, dense rock gradually detaches from the base of tectonic plates after continents split, behaving somewhat like blobs rising and falling in a lava lamp.

From Science Daily ● Nov. 25, 2025

The three blobs looked somewhere between frogs and ghosts and big boogers.

From "Popcorn" by Rob Harrell

Dr. Nguyen designed a simulated model of both individual and blobbed blackworms, involving small blobs of 20 identical worms.

From New York Times ● Oct. 25, 2021

Admittedly, as that student blobbed into the man I am today, I do wonder if the sedentary Lister was the wisest role model to choose.

From The Guardian ● Sep. 21, 2017

Revelers blobbed together, migrating as Rio’s winter twilight slipped in.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 19, 2016

He said three of the students had since asked "that their images be taken out" and that they would be "pixelated or blobbed".

From BBC ● Apr. 15, 2013

Meanwhile the deer-cart was drawn to the far side of a thick fence, and the door being opened, a lubberly-looking animal, as big as a donkey, blobbed out, and began feeding very composedly.

From Jorrocks' Jaunts and Jollities by Robert Smith Surtees

Dr. Ding, who studies blobbing in the much-studied nematode Caenorhabditis elegans, described her C. elegans blobs as “strongly overlapping, like a bowl of spaghetti noodles.”

From New York Times ● Oct. 25, 2021

Maisie suggested painting and I started blobbing out pretty colours.

From The Guardian ● Mar. 31, 2017

Beside her on each side, both Ess and Loo were already scribbling and blobbing ink all over their stones.

From "Orphan Island" by Laurel Snyder

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