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Synonyms

cab

1 American  
[kab] / kæb /

noun

  1. a taxicab.

    Synonyms:
    jitney, hackney, hack
  2. any of various horse-drawn vehicles, as a hansom or brougham, especially one for public hire.

    Synonyms:
    jitney, hackney, hack
  3. the covered or enclosed part of a locomotive, truck, crane, etc., where the operator sits.

  4. the glass-enclosed area of an airport control tower in which the controllers are stationed.


verb (used without object)

cabbed, cabbing
  1. to ride in a taxicab or horse-drawn cab.

    They cabbed to the theater.

cab 2 American  
[kab] / kæb /
Or kab

noun

  1. an ancient Hebrew measure equal to about two quarts.


cab 3 American  
[kab] / kæb /

noun

Chiefly British.
  1. cabbage.


CAB 4 American  
Or C.A.B.
cab 1 British  
/ kæb /

noun

    1. a taxi

    2. ( as modifier )

      a cab rank

  1. the enclosed compartment of a lorry, locomotive, crane, etc, from which it is driven or operated

  2. (formerly) a light horse-drawn vehicle used for public hire

  3. informal the first person, etc, to do or take advantage of something

"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

CAB 2 British  

abbreviation

  1. (in Britain) Citizens' Advice Bureau

  2. (in the US) Civil Aeronautics Board

"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

cab 3 British  
/ kæb /

noun

  1. an ancient Hebrew measure equal to about 2.3 litres (4 pints)

"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

Etymology

Origin of cab1

First recorded in 1640–50; short for cabriolet

Origin of cab2

First recorded in 1525–35; from Hebrew qabh

Explanation

A cab is a taxi, a car whose driver you pay to take you where you need to go. It can feel like a competitive sport to hail a cab in New York City. Your cab driver may talk incessantly while she drives you to the airport, or you might ride in a cab that's silent except for the sound of its horn honking at other drivers. You can also call the front part of a truck, where the driver sits, the cab. In the 1820s, the word meant "horse-drawn carriage," short for the French cabriolet, "leap or caper." The Latin root is capreolus, "wild goat."

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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:

She leaves the place—New York’s Tavern on the Green, in Central Park—and gets into a cab, kicking off the film’s opening credits.

From The Wall Street Journal Sep. 3, 2026

And Skyroot's cab service could also cater to Isro's space programmes, but Chandana says that "70-80% of our market would be the global economy".

From BBC Jul. 18, 2026

Consider when Gail and Otto arrive in Hollywood and hop in a cab driven by Richard Kind.

From Salon Jul. 12, 2026

He echoed the story he’d told the FBI—that he’d learned of the bombing from someone at his apartment—but then said he’d heard about it during a cab ride.

From Slate Jul. 7, 2026

The subway was shut down, so we stalked the street, searching for an available cab.

From "City of the Plague God" by Sarwat Chadda

"I'm going to give it my all until the end of the season to finish this adventure with CAB in the best possible way."

From BBC Apr. 6, 2026

"We found an unexpected chemical complexity, with abundances far higher than predicted by current theoretical models," explains lead author Dr. Ismael García Bernete formerly of Oxford University and now a researcher at CAB.

From Science Daily Feb. 12, 2026

Britain's CAB Payments has taken the rare step of setting a fixed price for its share offering that values it at the lower end of its previously reported range.

From Reuters Jun. 30, 2023

When Johnson’s private plane crashed in Texas that year, killing the two people who were on board, Mr. Boyd began investigating the crash for the CAB.

From Washington Post Oct. 19, 2020

Thus ∠A is read "BAC," the reflex angle on the outside of the triangle being read "CAB."

From The Teaching of Geometry by David Eugene Smith

Refusing to give up, Foster had a board mix put together of the first performance and cabbed it to the radio station.

From The Wall Street Journal Aug. 12, 2015

Their daughter told them she "cabbed it" but they say they do not know how she actually traveled cross-country or where she has been staying.

From Seattle Times Jul. 26, 2013

On Thursday night, I cabbed it to my goddaughter’s house in Fort Greene.

From Slate Nov. 12, 2012

It’s like a slower, 1950s version of the real city across that cool bridge we cabbed over last night.

From "Better Nate Than Ever" by Tim Federle

He cabbed it away from Luzatti's, and I cabbed it after him.

From Martin Hewitt, Investigator by Arthur Morrison

The day before E3 officially kicks off this year, I’ll be liveblogging the Ubisoft press conference, then cabbing it over to the L.A.

From Forbes Jun. 2, 2014

Max is a dreamer; a lonely man whose ideal of running a limo service is still unrealised after 12 years of "temporary" cabbing.

From Time Magazine Archive

"We seem destined to consort with the cabbing trade," I remarked; "the last office was over a mews, this place seems to belong to a carriage-builder."

From A Girl Among the Anarchists by Isabel Meredith

His sixteen "outsides" bestow upon me a supercilious look that conveys to me that they opine I am merely cabbing it to the station en route for a "suburban hop."

From The Confessions of a Caricaturist, Vol. 2 by Harry Furniss

To be sure, vettura driving is not like cabbing, and Gaetano was in the habit of getting out often and walking up the hills, thus exercising his liver.

From Hawthorne and His Circle by Julian Hawthorne

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