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• gi
  gi

  noun

  a lightweight, two-piece, usually white garment worn by barefooted martial-arts participants, consisting of loose-fitting pants and a wraparound jacket with cloth belt.
• Gi
  Gi

  gilbert; gilberts.
• GI
  GI

  noun

  a member or former member of the U.S. armed forces, especially an enlisted soldier.
• gi.
  gi.

  abbreviation

  gill; gills.
• G.I.
  G.I.

  abbreviation

  galvanized iron.

gi

¹ American  

[gee] / gi /

Or gie

noun

1. a lightweight, two-piece, usually white garment worn by barefooted martial-arts participants, consisting of loose-fitting pants and a wraparound jacket with cloth belt.

---

Gi ² American  

1. gilbert; gilberts.

---

GI ³ American  

[jee-ahy] / ˈdʒiˈaɪ /

Or G.I.

noun

• GI's,
  plural
• GIs
  plural

1. a member or former member of the U.S. armed forces, especially an enlisted soldier.

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adjective

1. rigidly adhering to military regulations and practices; regimented; spit-and-polish.

   a platoon leader who tried to be more GI than anyone else.

2. of a standardized style or type issued by the U.S. armed forces.

   GI shoes; GI blankets.

3. conforming to the regulations or practices of the U.S. armed forces.

   Every recruit must get a GI haircut.

4. of, relating to, or characteristic of a U.S. enlisted person.

   a typical peacetime GI complaint.

verb (used with object)

GI'd, GI'ing

1. to clean in preparation for inspection.

   to GI the barracks.

verb (used without object)

GI'd, GI'ing

1. to follow military regulations and customs closely; shape up.

   You'd better learn to GI if you want to be promoted.

gi. ⁴ American  

abbreviation

1. gill; gills.

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G.I. ⁵ American  

Also g.i.

abbreviation

1. galvanized iron.

2. gastrointestinal.

3. general issue.

4. government issue.

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GI ¹ British  

noun

1. a soldier in the US Army, esp an enlisted man

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adjective

1. conforming to US Army regulations; of standard government issue

GI ² British  

abbreviation

1. gastrointestinal

2. glycaemic index

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Gi ³ British  

abbreviation

1. gilbert

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gi ⁴ British  

/ ɡiː /

noun

1. a loose-fitting white suit worn in judo, karate, and other martial arts

   a karate gi

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gi ⁵ British  

abbreviation

1. Gibraltar

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• GI's
  plural
• GIs
  plural

Etymology

Origin of gi¹

1970–75; shortening of Japanese jūdō-gi jujitsu garb, equivalent to jūdō judo + -gi, combining form of ki to wear

Origin of GI³

1915–20; originally abbreviation of galvanized iron, used in U.S. Army bookkeeping in entering articles (e.g., trash cans) made of it; later extended to all articles issued (as an assumed abbreviation of government issue ) and finally to soldiers themselves

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

gi Gi GI gi. G.I. GI's GIs

Many followed his mother's request to attend the ceremony wearing a gi, the uniform worn in Jiu-Jitsu.

From BBC ● Aug. 9, 2022

Mr. Hector quickly broke into a sweat under his black gi, belted in brown.

From New York Times ● Apr. 29, 2022

Karate, another first on the Olympics calendar, felt ground-breaking for a similar reason, with men and women wearing the sport’s classic gi.

From Washington Post ● Aug. 6, 2021

Put on your intellectual gi, because your media-studies class begins now.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 18, 2021

“Madu! Is this you? O gi di ife a?”

From "Half of a Yellow Sun" by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

Meanwhile, 75% of the 1,881 UK jobseekers polled in July by recruiter Gi Group say they would not be put off applying to an organisation that had introduced AI proficiency into individual performance reviews.

From BBC ● Sep. 8, 2026

While the timing isn’t ideal for my new Gi experiment, I plan to unplug without abandoning Dr. Becky.

From Slate ● May 10, 2026

Two-way athlete Petelo Gi is a key player for Serra.

From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 9, 2021

Friends and family took to the Internet shorty after Kobe and Gi Gi passed to celebrate how much he loved his daughters, and fans soon followed with their own.

From Salon ● Jun. 20, 2021

Djishtangading: K, M, Go, Gi     13 9   11.

From The Aboriginal Population of the North Coast of California by Sherburne Friend Cook

I also have 11 months and 20 days remaining under the Post-9/11 GI Bill.

From MarketWatch ● Sep. 8, 2026

Joseph attended Harvard University on the GI bill and completed majors in math and physics in just three years.

From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 4, 2026

The researchers noted that "geographical regions influence the risk of GI cancers," suggesting that regional differences should be considered when making dietary recommendations.

From Science Daily ● Jul. 14, 2026

The GI Bill and the industrial boom drove the greatest project of mass education and mass consumption in world history.

From Salon ● Apr. 19, 2026

There were also demographic forces at work, beginning with the GI Bill, which sent a pioneering generation of evangelicals to college.

From "Class Matters" by The New York Times

“But I remember not even lasting long enough to get a gi. And I don’t think John and Hayden even made it that far.”

From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 10, 2022

“Your life belongs to you and you alone, soso gi. You will go back on Saturday. Let me hurry up and make some abacha for you to take.”

From "Half of a Yellow Sun" by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie

But from 1940 to 1960, a number of forces — a boom in home building following World War II, low-interest loans provided through the G.I.

From MarketWatch ● Sep. 8, 2026

He later enrolled in what’s now Cal State L.A. under the G.I.

From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 24, 2026

I grew up during the end of the Cold War, and I watched G.I.

From Salon ● Sep. 9, 2025

Which is how Alcaraz turned up two weeks ago in New York City looking not like Carlos Alcaraz, or Johnny Unitas, but like Demi Moore in G.I.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 8, 2025

That is why every G.I. letter home was read by censors who often blacked out big sections.

From "Code Talker: A Novel About the Navajo Marines of World War Two" by Joseph Bruchac

“It was lugged home in some GI’s duffel bag, without its case.”

From Slate ● Mar. 16, 2024

Anyway, after the bomb was dropped, the GI's who worked at the laboratory came up and shook my hand and said, “You were the person who stuck the hand of the great Enrico Fermi.”

From Scientific American ● Jul. 27, 2023

“I am not suggesting for any moment that I know,” of the GI’s location, Gen. Harrison said Monday.

From Washington Times ● Jul. 24, 2023

The aircraft chase the GI’s informal prayer as reliably as the violins tail the piano in Chanda Dancy’s treacly score.

From Washington Post ● Nov. 21, 2022

We're the only Army GI's in this outfit and this is pretty plush.

From Sonny by Rick Raphael

Pattaya was little more than a fishing village surrounded by jungle when young GIs deployed in Thailand visited the sleepy bay sometime in the late 1950s or early 1960s.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 1, 2026

In theory, the law was “colorblind,” offering the same educational support to Black GIs as to white GIs.

From MarketWatch ● Jun. 18, 2026

"The soldiers who once called each other Redcoats and Yankees became the Tommies and the GIs who together saved the free world," he said.

From Barron's ● Apr. 28, 2026

D’Aquino’s defense: She had been slyly subverting the propaganda machine the whole time, entertaining Americans with facetious language no one could take seriously and introducing upbeat American music the GIs actually loved.

From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 21, 2025

The GIs were spread on other planes and me and Peewee talked a lieutenant into putting us both on a flight to Fort Ord, in California.

From "Fallen Angels" by Walter Dean Myers