fruit

American  

[froot] / frut /

noun

• fruits,
  plural
• fruit
  plural

1. any product of plant growth useful to humans or animals.

2. the developed ovary of a seed plant with its contents and accessory parts, as the pea pod, nut, tomato, or pineapple.

3. the edible part of a plant developed from a flower, with any accessory tissues, as the peach, mulberry, or banana.

4. the spores and accessory organs of ferns, mosses, fungi, algae, or lichen.

5. anything produced or accruing; product, result, or effect; return or profit.

   the fruits of one's labors.

6. Slang: Extremely Disparaging and Offensive. a contemptuous term used to refer to a gay man.

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verb (used with or without object)

• fruits,
  present (3rd person singular)
• fruited,
  past participle,  past
• fruiting
  present participle

1. to bear or cause to bear fruit.

   a tree that fruits in late summer; careful pruning that sometimes fruits a tree.

fruit British  

/ fruːt /

noun

1. botany the ripened ovary of a flowering plant, containing one or more seeds. It may be dry, as in the poppy, or fleshy, as in the peach

2. any fleshy part of a plant, other than the above structure, that supports the seeds and is edible, such as the strawberry

3. the specialized spore-producing structure of plants that do not bear seeds

4. any plant product useful to man, including grain, vegetables, etc

5. (often plural) the result or consequence of an action or effort

6. old-fashioned chap; fellow: used as a term of address

7. slang a person considered to be eccentric or insane

8. slang a male homosexual

9. archaic offspring of man or animals; progeny

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verb

1. to bear or cause to bear fruit

fruit Scientific  

/ fro̅o̅t /

1. The ripened ovary of a flowering plant that contains the seeds, sometimes fused with other parts of the plant. Fruits can be dry or fleshy. Berries, nuts, grains, pods, and drupes are fruits.

2. ◆ Fruits that consist of ripened ovaries alone, such as the tomato and pea pod, are called true fruits.

3. ◆ Fruits that consist of ripened ovaries and other parts such as the receptacle or bracts, as in the apple, are called accessory fruits or false fruits.

4. See also aggregate fruit multiple fruit simple fruit See Note at berry

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fruit Cultural  

1. In botany, the part of a seed-bearing plant that contains the fertilized seeds capable of generating a new plant (see fertilization). Fruit develops from the female part of the plant. Apples, peaches, tomatoes, and many other familiar foods are fruits.

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fruit Idioms  

1. see bear fruit; forbidden fruit.

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Usage

To most of us, a fruit is a plant part that is eaten as a dessert or snack because it is sweet, but to a botanist a fruit is a mature ovary of a plant, and as such it may or may not taste sweet. All species of flowering plants produce fruits that contain seeds. A peach, for example, contains a pit that can grow into a new peach tree, while the seeds known as peas can grow into another pea vine. To a botanist, apples, peaches, peppers, tomatoes, pea pods, cucumbers, and winged maple seeds are all fruits. A vegetable is simply part of a plant that is grown primarily for food. Thus, the leaf of spinach, the root of a carrot, the flower of broccoli, and the stalk of celery are all vegetables. In everyday, nonscientific speech we make the distinction between sweet plant parts (fruits) and nonsweet plant parts (vegetables). This is why we speak of peppers and cucumbers and squash—all fruits in the eyes of a botanist—as vegetables.

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• fruitlike
  adjective

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• fruit
  plural
• fruits
  plural

Participles

• fruiting
  present
• fruited
  past

Conjugated Forms

Present

• fruit
  simple
• fruits
  simple
• have fruited
  perfect
• has fruited
  perfect
• am fruiting
  progressive
• are fruiting
  progressive
• is fruiting
  progressive
• have been fruiting
  perfect progressive
• has been fruiting
  perfect progressive

Past

• fruited
  simple
• had fruited
  perfect
• was fruiting
  progressive
• were fruiting
  progressive
• had been fruiting
  perfect progressive

Future

• will fruit
  simple
• will have fruited
  perfect
• will be fruiting
  progressive
• will have been fruiting
  perfect progressive

Etymology

Origin of fruit

First recorded in 1125–75; Middle English, from Old French, from Latin frūctus “enjoyment, profit, fruit,” equivalent to frūg-, variant stem of fruī “to enjoy the produce of” + -tus suffix of verbal action

Explanation

The fruit of something is what it produces, like the apples on apples trees, the grapes on grapevines, or the fruit of your labor, like the cake you baked. Fruit comes from the Latin fructus, whose root is frui, "to enjoy." The fruit of a plant, like an orange or banana, is the product of the plant that we enjoy. (You wouldn't munch on the orange tree's branch, would you?) But fruit is also the product of any work. A woven rug is the fruit of the loom, while an infant, figuratively, is called the fruit of the womb.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

fruit fruits fruited fruiting

"The trees are stressed without any water, so they've just dumped the fruit on the ground to save themselves."

From BBC ● Aug. 25, 2026

Many trees have produced no fruit at all, and others have dropped their fruit early, rotting before they ripened.

From BBC ● Aug. 25, 2026

Meghan sells fruit spreads in $12 individual jars or $42 for a trio.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 21, 2026

Then I saw a jar of sun-dried tomatoes I’d never noticed before, packed with dark, jewel-like fruit.

From Salon ● Aug. 20, 2026

We drew up by a tall pile of crated fruit.

From "Secrets at Sea" by Richard Peck

When you’re looking at a thread of social media bots sharing the same five replies to AI-generated slapfights between anthropomorphic fruits, it can be hard to remember the internet used to be a lively place.

From Salon ● Aug. 23, 2026

The U.S. manufacturing sector is enjoying the fruits of the AI boom.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 18, 2026

Though the beetles snack on fruits we might also desire, they’re generally not considered pests, said Karey Windbiel-Rojas, an associate director with the University of California’s statewide integrated pest management program.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 18, 2026

The diet emphasizes fresh fruits and vegetables, fish, nuts, and olive oil — and limiting foods like red meat, cheese and sugar.

From MarketWatch ● Aug. 16, 2026

Heavy with glossy pink and white fruits, the coral tree branches swayed softly above her.

From "When the Sea Turned to Silver" by Grace Lin

Over the 250 years since America’s birth, there have been amber waves of great comic material, veritable fruited plains of satirical fodder.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 25, 2026

The explanation for their propinquity lies not in the creation of some whiz-bang, life-changing, paradigm-bending consumer product, or the shining virtues or particularly fertile minds that grace Silicon Valley’s fruited plain.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 26, 2025

Observing that peaches in the Carolinas germinated easily and fruited heavily, English explorer and naturalist John Lawson wrote in 1700 that "they make our Land a Wilderness of Peach-Trees."

From Salon ● Jun. 8, 2023

Home to Lincoln Beer Company, patrons can sip on the brewery’s “perfectly pineapple” fruited wheat pints within sight of the building’s towers, reaching nobly into the Southern California skies.

From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 8, 2023

"Purple fruited makes more sense. How about grapes or plums?"

From "The Westing Game" by Ellen Raskin

A fully realized edible garden, complete with raised beds and fruiting trees, enhances the property’s sense of abundance and connection to nature.”

From MarketWatch ● Jun. 25, 2026

"Seasons no longer follow a pattern. Flowering, fruiting, and harvesting all shift every year because of climate change," says Singh, now 62.

From BBC ● Feb. 19, 2026

At Taï, where chimps more often eat fruit that has fallen, the team similarly gathered undamaged and unbitten fruits from the ground below fruiting trees.

From Science Daily ● Dec. 1, 2025

To enable robots to navigate fields and harvest efficiently, many farms would need to plant fruiting walls—apple trees that have been trained to grow in dense canopies against flat vertical surfaces.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 29, 2025

You’ve been up Kindcreek Road before; it cuts through a wild patch of hill country, flanked by fruiting prickly pears and disheveled oak.

From "Legendary Frybread Drive-In" by Cynthia Leitich Smith

Related Words

• berry
• crop
• grain
• nut
• produce
• product