child
noun
a person between birth and puberty or full growth.
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child
1 American
[chahyld]
/ tʃaɪld /
noun
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children
plural
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a person between birth and puberty or full growth.
books for children.
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a son or daughter; offspring considered with regard to parents.
All my children are married.
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a baby or infant.
A child of six months can recognize family members.
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a human fetus.
My sister is seven months pregnant with a healthy child.
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a childish person.
He's such a child about money.
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a descendant.
a child of an ancient breed.
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any person or thing regarded as the product or result of particular agencies, influences, etc..
Abstract art is a child of the 20th century.
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a person regarded as conditioned or marked by a given circumstance, situation, etc..
a child of poverty; a child of famine.
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British Dialect, Archaic. a female infant.
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Archaic. childe.
idioms
Child
2
American
[chahyld]
/ tʃaɪld /
noun
-
Julia, 1912–2004, U.S. gourmet cook, author, and television personality.
-
Lydia Maria (Francis), 1802–80, U.S. author, abolitionist, and social reformer.
child
British
/ tʃaɪld /
noun
-
-
a boy or girl between birth and puberty
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( as modifier )
child labour
-
-
a baby or infant
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an unborn baby
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another term for pregnant
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a human offspring; a son or daughter
-
a childish or immature person
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a member of a family or tribe; descendant
a child of Israel
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a person or thing regarded as the product of an influence or environment
a child of nature
-
dialect a female infant
child
More Idioms
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Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of child
First recorded before 950; Middle English; Old English cild; akin to Gothic kilthai “womb”
Explanation
A child is a young person who's typically older than a baby but younger than a teen. As a child, you probably had your parents watching over you as you played in a sandbox. The noun child come from the Old English word cild, meaning "child, infant." Retaining a similar meaning into modern times, the word still refers to a young person, male or female. But you can be considered a child after reaching adulthood — in the eyes of your parents, at least. Immature behavior like throwing a temper tantrum can also mark you as a child. The word can also refer to someone in a clan or tribe, young or old.
Vocabulary lists containing child
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:
Simon hopes it moves the tribes one step closer to freely catching the chi again, like he did as a child.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 11, 2026
"That was the part that I wasn't really taught until I did my own research. It's really hard to explain what a terrorist is to a child."
From BBC ● Sep. 11, 2026
“When a child is lost,” Mr. Saunders writes, “there is no end to the self-torment a parent may inflict.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 11, 2026
Were my parents trying to spare me, as a young child, from learning about human atrocity, or was the Holocaust, and the damage it had done to our family, too difficult for them to confront?
From Slate ● Sep. 11, 2026
The mother began to protest, but the child pleaded, “It matches my shoes! I’ll wash it a hundred times!”
From "The Undead Fox of Deadwood Forest" by Aubrey Hartman
Anak Krakatau, which means Child of Krakatoa, has been sporadically active since it emerged from the sea at the beginning of last century in the caldera formed after the 1883 eruption of Mount Krakatoa.
From BBC ● Sep. 7, 2026
Anak Krakatau, which means Child of Krakatau, sits in a strait that separates the islands of Java and Sumatra.
From Barron's ● Sep. 7, 2026
Nominated by the charity, Gracie received a certificate of merit from the Child of Wales Awards 2026 last week, in recognition of her outstanding fundraising efforts.
From BBC ● Aug. 28, 2026
While California’s costs are an outlier, most states have sought to increase child sex-abuse survivors’ access to the legal system in recent decades, according to Child USA, an advocacy group.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 27, 2026
"Child," said the father sympathetically and with obvious appreciation, "then what should we do?"
From "The Metamorphosis" by Franz Kafka
"A tragedy of such magnitude, which has shattered the dreams and futures of so many children, cannot become just another news story," he wrote on X.
From Barron's ● Sep. 12, 2026
Sharma is the second of five children born to parents who immigrated to Racine, Wis., from New Zealand, to join her aunt, whose husband owned a metal fabrication company.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 12, 2026
Two children and a woman have been injured while on a fairground ride in South Yorkshire, police said.
From BBC ● Sep. 11, 2026
Knight apologised to Ben and their children: "I'm sorry you lost Sarah in the way you did. You have shown great dignity throughout the proceedings... What you went though must have been horrendous."
From BBC ● Sep. 11, 2026
One day I’ll tell my children how Caesar and Midnight changed the journey.
From "Will’s Race for Home" by Jewell Parker Rhodes
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.
