brad
noun
a slender wire nail having either a small, deep head or a projection to one side of the head end.
brad
1 American
[brad]
/ bræd /
noun
-
brads
plural
verb (used with object)
bradded,
bradding
Brad
2
American
[brad]
/ bræd /
noun
brad
British
/ bræd /
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of brad
1425–75; late Middle English brad, dialectal variant of Middle English brod ( d ) sprout, shoot, nail < Old Norse braddr, cognate with Old English brord spike ( see braird)
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:
Starting with the centermost box, hold the top molding piece level and attach it to the wall with your brad nailer, adding a nail every 12 inches.
From Seattle Times ● May 12, 2023
“Whoever picked that cover for brad pitt’s GQ issue is getting fireddddd,” wrote @nicholasdante_.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 23, 2022
Louis Vuitton logo brad is seen outside a Louis Vuitton store in Paris, France, January 27, 2020.
From Reuters ● Sep. 22, 2021
Tweeted one: “walter is brad pitt for us smart girls.”
From Washington Post ● Mar. 28, 2017
I just kept working and fastened the halves together with the brad.
From "The Boy on the Wooden Box" by Leon Leyson
They have loudly given speeches at El Camino Real Board of Director meetings, calling for the resignation of chairman Brad Wright, who has since resigned.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 15, 2026
Brad Cooper, the U.S. military commander for the Middle East, has described the Lincoln’s deployment as “one of the most operationally intense and consequential of the modern era.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 5, 2026
"Sometimes you have to restructure a business when it's not doing well, and that was true with our Xbox business," Microsoft's president Brad Smith recently told the BBC.
From BBC ● Sep. 4, 2026
Brad Cooper, took to the pages of the Wall Street Journal to do damage control.
From Salon ● Aug. 29, 2026
He noticed Brad was the last to leave, as if he were not eager to join the others for lunch.
From "Ralph S. Mouse" by Beverly Cleary
Paper bag, plush, and recently she started making flat ones out of cardboard that have joints made out of metal brads giving them some mobility.
From Washington Times ● Sep. 10, 2016
An insurance adjuster allowed the claim, but the company discovered that smart Gerald Bodine had mulcted insurance firms ten times for gulping nails, brads, tacks, pins, et al.
From Time Magazine Archive
I had been promoted from gluing on the bristles to fastening the wooden halves of a brush together with brads.
From "The Boy on the Wooden Box" by Leon Leyson
Such boxes, or two-piece diminutive kegs, are used as containers for articles shipped and sold in small bulk, such as tacks, small nails, and brads.
From Seasoning of Wood by J. B. (Joseph Bernard) Wagner
The aluminum bottom does not run completely over the bow piece, but merely overlaps it sufficiently to be fastened by brass brads, as illustrated in Fig.
From Boys' Book of Model Boats by Raymond F. (Raymond Francis) Yates
I switched on the light and looked into a cracked piece of mirror bradded with bent nails to the wall.
From "Black Like Me" by John Howard Griffin
You have bradded me on, and told me that a man of the woods always gets what he wants if he goes after it right.
From King Spruce, A Novel by Holman Day
It was three planks thick, crossed one another and bradded together wid iron nails.
From Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves Arkansas Narratives, Part 2 by Work Projects Administration
They come in thick wood doors with iron nails bradded through, fastened on big hinges, fastened it with chains and iron bars.
From Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States from Interviews with Former Slaves, Arkansas Narratives, Part 4 by Work Projects Administration
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.
