butter
Americannoun
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the fatty portion of milk, separating as a soft whitish or yellowish solid when milk or cream is agitated or churned.
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this substance, processed for cooking and table use.
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any of various other soft spreads for bread.
apple butter; peanut butter.
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any of various substances of butterlike consistency, as various metallic chlorides, and certain vegetable oils solid at ordinary temperatures.
verb (used with object)
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to put butter on or in; spread or grease with butter.
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to apply a liquefied bonding material to (a piece or area), as mortar to a course of bricks.
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Metalworking. to cover (edges to be welded together) with a preliminary surface of the weld metal.
verb phrase
noun
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an edible fatty whitish-yellow solid made from cream by churning, for cooking and table use
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( as modifier )
butter icing
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any substance with a butter-like consistency, such as peanut butter or vegetable butter
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to look innocent, although probably not so
verb
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to put butter on or in
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to flatter
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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buttersimple
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butterssimple
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have butteredperfect
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has butteredperfect
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am butteringprogressive
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are butteringprogressive
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is butteringprogressive
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have been butteringperfect progressive
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has been butteringperfect progressive
Past
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butteredsimple
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had butteredperfect
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was butteringprogressive
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were butteringprogressive
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had been butteringperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of butter
before 1000; Middle English; Old English butere < Latin būtȳrum < Greek boútȳron
Explanation
Butter is a creamy spread made from milk fat. Your favorite breakfast might be hot toast slathered with butter. The process of making butter involves churning cream until the fats coagulate and become creamy and pale yellow. Butter is sometimes salted, and usually formed into sticks for cooks to use in frying, baking, and spreading on corn on the cob and baked goods. To do this is to butter your bread. The Greek root word is boutyron, literally "cow cheese," from bous, "cow."
Vocabulary lists containing butter
Yellow
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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.
She’s like an Auntie Mame, only her version of extravagance is peanut butter sundaes at Serendipity 3, a course at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and tickets to see Diana Rigg on Broadway in “Medea.”
From Los Angeles Times • Jul. 8, 2026
The entrepreneur, convicted of defrauding the bank, and her lawyers have racked up $144.2 million in bills, with receipts including gummy bears and cellulite butter.
From The Wall Street Journal • Jul. 2, 2026
Buttermilk, cornbread, apple butter, pork and kale, and other dishes will all be on McIntyre's menu.
From BBC • Jul. 1, 2026
She makes bread using flour from her wheat, together with red beans from her fields, to eat alongside butter and dried yoghurt made by her husband.
From Barron's • Jul. 1, 2026
She opened her own lunch box and took out some peanut butter crackers.
From "Pony Problems: Nancy Drew and the Clue Crew, #3" by Carolyn Keene
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.
