doodle
1 Americanverb (used with or without object)
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doodles,
present (3rd person singular)
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doodled,
past participle, past
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doodling
present participle
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to draw or scribble idly.
He doodled during the whole lecture.
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to waste (time) in aimless or foolish activity.
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Dialect. to deceive; cheat.
noun
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a design, figure, or the like, made by idle scribbling.
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Archaic. a foolish or silly person.
noun
verb
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to scribble or draw aimlessly
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to play or improvise idly
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to dawdle or waste time
noun
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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doodlesimple
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doodlessimple
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have doodledperfect
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has doodledperfect
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am doodlingprogressive
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are doodlingprogressive
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is doodlingprogressive
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have been doodlingperfect progressive
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has been doodlingperfect progressive
Past
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doodledsimple
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had doodledperfect
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was doodlingprogressive
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were doodlingprogressive
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had been doodlingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of doodle1
1625–30 in archaic sense “a fool”; 1935–40 in current senses; compare Low German dudeltopf simpleton
Origin of doodle2
Probably extracted from cock-a-doodle-doo ( def. ); a euphemism for cock 3, to avoid association with cock 1, in sense “penis”
Explanation
A doodle is a casual little drawing you do, often while you're doing something else, like talking on the phone or listening to a teacher's lecture. Your history notebook might be equal parts notes and doodles. A doodle can vary from a meaningless scribble or scrawl to a detailed picture of a dog. You never draw a doodle for some specific purpose — to doodle is to draw in an aimless, haphazard way. In the 1600s, a doodle was a "simple fellow," from the German dudeltopf, "simpleton." It came to mean "foolish designs on paper" by the early 20th century.
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:
They compared popular designer doodle breeds - cockapoos, labradoodles and cavapoos - to their purebred parent breeds across multiple behaviour categories.
From BBC ● Mar. 18, 2026
At the bottom, one added a postscript—“Peut-être y a t’il autre chose en NZ”—along with a doodle, which has been endlessly parsed in the decades since.
From Slate ● Jul. 22, 2025
Hockney also took long drives in order to find interesting landscapes to doodle.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 7, 2025
Only, oopsie doodle, due to a serious knock on the head, Samantha forgot that she’s actually a CIA-trained black-ops agent.
From Salon ● Dec. 7, 2024
“And then she freaked out,” I repeated, “and went and got the tulips while we were getting the fireworks. She saw the doodle, remembered whatever she’d forgotten, and then freaked out.”
From "Looking for Alaska" by John Green
But he just doodles pictures of hamburgers during those.
From Slate ● Sep. 19, 2026
This plot doodles along, rarely going where we expect.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 9, 2026
The results showed designer doodles differed from their purebred parents in just over half of all comparisons.
From BBC ● Mar. 18, 2026
The comics that began as office doodles during boring meetings grew into an empire for Adams with companion books, a short-lived animated show and an ill-fated burrito line.
From Salon ● Jan. 13, 2026
Principal Principal sits back in his chair and doodles a hornet.
From "Speak" by Laurie Halse Anderson
In her teenage years, she doodled poems in her diaries and made up verses about physics to help her remember things for her exams.
From BBC ● Jul. 26, 2026
She developed, writes Ms. Lutz, a “weird, witchy” sense of humor, doodled violent images in the margins of her books and made a specialty, in her poetry and prose, of the “nocturnal and crepuscular.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 22, 2026
And sometimes, it seems like people just get bored, like the Whitney Museum guard who doodled “I Love you Tushee, Love, Buns” on a Roy Lichtenstein painting in 1993.
From Slate ● Oct. 28, 2022
An arena-size canvas merely doodled on with pencil.
From New York Times ● Aug. 23, 2022
I absentmindedly doodled one on my homework last night and had to tear it into a billion pieces and flush them down the toilet.
From "Linked" by Gordon Korman
On a notebook on her coffee table, she wrote Cynthia Renee Ortiz, doodling hearts around her prospective married name.
From Slate ● Apr. 6, 2026
A priest, noticing Pratt’s skillful doodling, bought him art supplies and showed him a collection of work by the Kiowa Five, a renowned group of early 20th-century painters who’d attended the school.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 29, 2026
He appeared more focused on doodling on a pad of paper than the news conference.
From BBC ● May 16, 2024
The only relevant purpose I can see for this conceptual doodling, however well carried out, is to give the fifth Broadway incarnation of the 1966 show a distinctive profile.
From New York Times ● Apr. 21, 2024
Back in fourth grade, our teacher, Ms. Diamatis, started calling him Bob English Who Draws because he was always zoning out and doodling with a superfine Sharpie.
From "Liar & Spy" by Rebecca Stead
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.
