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
1 American
[gee]
/ gi /
Or
gie
noun
Gi
2
American
GI
3
American
[jee-ahy]
/ ˈdʒiˈaɪ /
Or
G.I.
noun
-
GI's,
plural
-
GIs
plural
adjective
-
rigidly adhering to military regulations and practices; regimented; spit-and-polish.
a platoon leader who tried to be more GI than anyone else.
-
of a standardized style or type issued by the U.S. armed forces.
GI shoes; GI blankets.
-
conforming to the regulations or practices of the U.S. armed forces.
Every recruit must get a GI haircut.
-
of, relating to, or characteristic of a U.S. enlisted person.
a typical peacetime GI complaint.
verb (used with object)
GI'd,
GI'ing
verb (used without object)
GI'd,
GI'ing
gi.
4
American
abbreviation
G.I.
5
American
Also
g.i.
abbreviation
-
galvanized iron.
-
gastrointestinal.
-
general issue.
-
government issue.
GI
1
British
noun
adjective
GI
2
British
abbreviation
-
gastrointestinal
-
glycaemic index
Gi
3
British
abbreviation
gi
4
British
/ ɡiː /
noun
gi
5
British
abbreviation
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
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
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:
Then the boys — dressed in gi, posed in defiant stances — leap out of the frame.
From New York Times ● Feb. 3, 2023
Photos from the event show Hardy donning a blue gi, wearing a blue belt, the second adult rank in jiu-jitsu, which often requires hundreds of hours of training to achieve.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 20, 2022
Many followed his mother's request to attend the ceremony wearing a gi, the uniform worn in Jiu-Jitsu.
From BBC ● Aug. 9, 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
“Ka m bunie afa gi enu ...” Aunty Ifeoma and Obiora joined her, their voices melding.
From "Purple Hibiscus" by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
In the Starbucks drive-thru, I open Gi and linger over a poll about problem behaviors.
From Slate ● May 10, 2026
Renowned illustrator Kim Jung Gi died Monday in Paris at age 47 after suffering a heart attack, the Daniel Maghen art gallery announced Wednesday.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 5, 2022
As well as community service, the rapper has been ordered to stay away from the victims, identified as Jade and Baddie Gi, for three years.
From BBC ● Sep. 16, 2022
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
Gi denotes plurality and follows the noun: na mwane gi the males.
From Grammar and Vocabulary of the Lau Language, Solomon Islands by W. G. (Walter George) Ivens
"Moving this work into a clinical trial is a landmark development for our GI cancer program at Sylvester," Datta said.
From Science Daily ● Sep. 12, 2026
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
I log in to GI, a deck called “How Boundaries Build Safety.”
From Slate ● May 10, 2026
He thought of Emo then, always with a GI haircut.
From "Ceremony:" by Leslie Marmon Silko
“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
Nick C. Kirk offers a shot of cheery nostalgia with his scenes filled with “Star Wars” and G.I.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 24, 2026
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
Universities were filled with veterans on the G.I.
From Salon ● Apr. 6, 2025
Those all happened to be well-known ’80s titles such as Image’s G.I.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 28, 2025
With a G.I. business loan, he had die bar remodeled into a diner counter and had a small kitchen installed.
From "Middlesex: A Novel" by Jeffrey Eugenides
“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
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
A GI’s fiancee resents his marriage of convenience to a buddy’s English girlfriend.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 3, 2020
We're the only Army GI's in this outfit and this is pretty plush.
From Sonny by Rick Raphael
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
American GIs brought swing records, Lucky Strike cigarettes and the Sears Roebuck mail-order catalog to Inuit residents who embraced the possibilities of 20th-century life.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 24, 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
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.
