eddy
noun
a current at variance with the main current in a stream of liquid or gas, especially one having a rotary or whirling motion.
eddy
1 American
[ed-ee]
/ ˈɛd i /
noun
-
eddies
plural
-
a current at variance with the main current in a stream of liquid or gas, especially one having a rotary or whirling motion.
-
a small whirlpool.
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any similar current, as of air, dust, or fog.
-
a current or trend, as of opinion or events, running counter to the main current.
verb (used with or without object)
-
eddies,
present (3rd person singular)
-
eddied,
past participle, past
-
eddying
present participle
Eddy
1
British
/ ˈɛdɪ /
noun
eddy
2
British
/ ˈɛdɪ /
noun
-
a movement in a stream of air, water, or other fluid in which the current doubles back on itself causing a miniature whirlwind or whirlpool
-
a deviation from or disturbance in the main trend of thought, life, etc, esp one that is relatively unimportant
verb
eddy
Scientific
/ ĕd′ē /
-
A current, as of water or air, moving in a direction that is different from that of the main current. Eddies generally involve circular motion; unstable patterns of eddies are often called turbulence.
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See also vortex
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
eddysimple
-
eddiessimple
-
have eddiedperfect
-
has eddiedperfect
-
am eddyingprogressive
-
are eddyingprogressive
-
is eddyingprogressive
-
have been eddyingperfect progressive
-
has been eddyingperfect progressive
Past
-
eddiedsimple
-
had eddiedperfect
-
was eddyingprogressive
-
were eddyingprogressive
-
had been eddyingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of eddy
1425–75; late Middle English; Old English ed- turning + ēa water; akin to Old Norse itha
Explanation
An eddy is a whirlpool — what you stare at as a kid when the water is draining out of the bathtub. Pronounced exactly like the name, “Eddie,” this word means to swirl in a direction opposite of the current. Any substance like water, fog, smoke, or air can create an eddy, but it is most commonly seen as a term related to water. Books from the "flapper" era of the 1920s often include a description of a nightclub with "an eddy of cigarette smoke above a woman’s head."
Vocabulary lists containing eddy
List 4
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"The Odyssey" by Homer, Books 8–13
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Life Is So Good
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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:
In one part of the conveyor system, a vibrating panel called an eddy current creates a sort of reverse magnet that repels nonferrous materials like aluminum beverage cans into their own collection area.
From Barron's ● Jun. 17, 2026
Navigating the galleries, which spill into each other, is akin to being dizzyingly spun from eddy to eddy.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 29, 2025
The process, Hauptman said, has made him feel like “an eddy in a river.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 12, 2025
Temperature data from satellites and buoys revealed a large southbound eddy moving through the region, coupled with 4 days of strong easterly winds, fueled strong upwelling.
From Science Magazine ● Apr. 15, 2024
Kid Sampson, Nately and the others wandered apart in a noiseless eddy of motion and were sucked away into the cloying yellow stillness.
From "Catch-22" by Joseph Heller
The 27-year-old UAE Team Emirates-XRG rider crossed the line on Paris' Champs-Elysees in the peloton, to join Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault and Miguel Indurain as the endurance event's most successful male riders.
From BBC ● Jul. 26, 2026
Pogacar, 27, is aiming to become the joint-most successful rider in the Tour's history with five wins, alongside Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault and Miguel Indurain.
From BBC ● Jul. 24, 2026
The Celtic languages and literature department, for instance, has drastically different funding and personnel needs compared with the physics department, Eddy says.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 17, 2026
Harvard also hired management consultant McKinsey, who helped with data analytics and brought knowledge of how similar entities operate, said Eddy.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 17, 2026
My knowledge of Canuck French derives from motion pictures usually with Nelson Eddy and Jeanette MacDonald, and it consists largely of “By gar.”
From "Travels with Charley in Search of America" by John Steinbeck
It happens through a combination of eddies, mixing, rotation and friction close to land.
From BBC ● Jul. 14, 2026
“It’s a little bit like if you're kayaking in a river, and there's rocks underneath the water, sometimes there's eddies in the surface, which can tell you about the rocks under the water,” explained Ockenden.
From BBC ● Jan. 15, 2026
The sources of our malaise are deeper than the shallow eddies of fashion and entertainment in “Blank Space.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 5, 2025
In the case of the Agulhas Current, researchers in 2016 reported that since the 1990s its flow had grown broader and was more likely to create potent eddies.
From Science Magazine ● Apr. 15, 2024
It was actually in the shallows, its feet lost in little foaming eddies that curled against the bank.
From "Strange the Dreamer" by Laini Taylor
“You felt you were escaping the city when you went to 10th Avenue,” he said, retracing his steps as tourists eddied around him.
From New York Times ● Jun. 1, 2016
When even relatively happy, well-supported people become the primary caretaker of a very small person, they tend to find themselves eddied out from the world of adults.
From New York Times ● Oct. 14, 2015
All around, the floor had grown treacherous from the slippery fallen gold, which eddied into corners, like piles of leaves.
From The New Yorker ● Sep. 21, 2015
Around them eddied the murky water, bearing straw from the harvest, pieces of furniture, bobbing coffins released from cemeteries.
From Time Magazine Archive
“I don’t know,” he said; smoke eddied slowly from his nostrils.
From "Native Son" by Richard Wright
On cue, they lift sun-reflecting mirrored panels above their heads and begin an eddying, light-glinting processional dance of protest and preservation.
From New York Times ● Dec. 7, 2022
Its ambiguities and enigmas add up to not more eddying confusions but to a stark reminder that the only reasonable response to grief is “life life life.”
From Washington Post ● Sep. 22, 2022
The crowds mostly kept a respectful distance but in sight of the gate, eddying like pilgrims gathered around a shrine, only breaking their vigil to watch a plane arc slowly by.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 24, 2021
But the highlight was an impossibly sustained high harmonic, eddying above distant turbulence from the timpani.
From The Guardian ● Feb. 3, 2013
I could not say how far we’d gone, but at a widening bend of the river, I felt us slow in the eddying current along the other shore.
From "100 Sideways Miles" by Andrew Smith
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.
