glue
Americannoun
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a hard, impure, protein gelatin, obtained by boiling skins, hoofs, and other animal substances in water, that when melted or diluted is a strong adhesive.
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any of various solutions or preparations of this substance, used as an adhesive.
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any of various other solutions or preparations that can be used as adhesives.
verb (used with object)
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glues,
present (3rd person singular)
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glued,
past participle, past
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gluing
present participle
noun
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any natural or synthetic adhesive, esp a sticky gelatinous substance prepared by boiling animal products such as bones, skin, and horns
-
any other sticky or adhesive substance
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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gluesimple
-
gluessimple
-
have gluedperfect
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has gluedperfect
-
am gluingprogressive
-
are gluingprogressive
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is gluingprogressive
-
have been gluingperfect progressive
-
has been gluingperfect progressive
Past
-
gluedsimple
-
had gluedperfect
-
was gluingprogressive
-
were gluingprogressive
-
had been gluingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of glue
1300–50; (noun) Middle English glu, gleu < Old French glu < Latin glūt- (stem of glūs ); cognate with Greek gloiós gum, anything sticky; (v.) Middle English glywen, glewen, derivative of the noun
Explanation
Glue is a liquid adhesive, used to stick two items together. A little kid may use Elmer's glue to decorate an art project, and you may use Krazy Glue to repair a mug's broken handle. Whatever the case, you hope the glue sticks. Most glue comes in a squeeze bottle and is used in small drips and lines to paste one material to another, but some glue comes in solid sticks that aren't as messy. When you stick one thing to another with glue, you glue it. The Old French source of glue is glu, from the Latin gluten, which means both "glue" and "beeswax."
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:
What archaeologists once regarded primarily as prehistoric glue may also have been a useful substance for protecting wounds, offering another intriguing possibility about the origins of human medical knowledge.
From Science Daily ● Oct. 11, 2026
Doncic and returning guard Austin Reaves are the glue that holds the puzzle together.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 27, 2026
Much of my life is dedicated to preaching that art, and practicing reverence for it can be the glue that keeps us together when the world wants us torn apart.
From Salon ● Sep. 17, 2026
Only through a renewed encounter with Athens, Jerusalem and Rome can we recover the intellectual and moral glue that binds a society together despite technological and cultural changes.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 15, 2026
Grandma allowed my sister to stick to her like glue because she knew Adria needed that security.
From "Courage to Soar" by Simone Biles
Nvidia glues everything together with software called CUDA, short for “compute unified device architecture.”
From Barron's ● May 29, 2026
When counterfeiters make fake versions—phony name-brand sneakers, for instance—they don’t use the same materials, glues, dyes and paints that the legitimate manufacturer does.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 17, 2026
"These often have added chemicals, flavourings, stabilisers and glues, are often lacking many real nutrients and could have a detrimental effect on someone's health," she said.
From BBC ● Feb. 23, 2026
But despite its water-sensitive glues and exposed hydraulics, the seahorse completed its route intact.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 3, 2026
“He even cuts out little letters and glues them to the paper.”
From "Small Steps" by Louis Sachar
And Taylor Farms would certainly top the list for anyone glued to a toilet bowl lately, thanks to the company’s alleged indiscretion handling lettuce laced with the “explosive diarrhea” parasite.
From Salon ● Aug. 19, 2026
Dogs snored next to their owners, who were glued to their phones, screens lighting up weary faces.
From Barron's ● Aug. 16, 2026
It has nothing to do with efficiency, and actually, for something with a reputation so closely glued to antiestablishment aesthetics and fashions of the counterculture, is quite frivolous if you think about it.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 12, 2026
Wearing a headset and glued to her laptop, Walaa discusses AI on a video call with her mentor in California's Silicon Valley.
From BBC ● Aug. 3, 2026
My eyes keep going back and forth between Edie—dragging her fork through her food, her eyes glued to the table—and Ruby, who is talking to one of the Graces.
From "How to Disappear Completely" by Ali Standish
He likens what the group is doing to “building a puzzle out of thousands of other puzzles, gluing it together to make a new thing.”
From Los Angeles Times ● May 20, 2026
She refers to a "ridiculous" sketch from week two set in an Industrial Revolution-era factory, in which the cast were tasked with gluing the ends of fast food restaurant wraps together.
From BBC ● May 17, 2026
Other recent protests have involved activists blocking highway traffic in various parts of Italy, and gluing hands of activists to the protective glass of a Botticelli painting in the Uffizi Gallery.
From Washington Times ● Dec. 7, 2023
Together with the team, he analyzed it by first cutting a very thin slice about 50 micrometers thick and then gluing it onto glass.
From Science Daily ● Oct. 27, 2023
We stood as far away from the edge as we could, gluing our bodies to the minaret.
From "Tasting the Sky" by Ibtisam Barakat
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.
