grandchild
Americannoun
noun
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of grandchild
Explanation
If you have a grandparent, you are a grandchild. You are the grandchild of your mother’s and father’s parents. If you have a grandchild, your son or daughter had a baby. Congratulations. A person becomes a grandparent when their kid has their first baby, and that baby is the grandparent’s grandchild. Boys are often called "grandsons," and girls "granddaughters," but both are also grandchildren. Grandchild uses the family or genealogical sense of the prefix grand-, which first meant "a generation older than," and since Elizabethan times has also meant "a generation younger than."
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:
Jones was reported missing July 7 after she didn’t pick up her grandchild and wasn’t responding to phone calls, according to the release.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 17, 2026
My dad was a scientist and, looking back to their lives in India…I remember looking back and being like, if my grandparents were here, could they even imagine that their grandchild did this?
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 24, 2026
The baby will be the first grandchild of Gordon Ramsay and his wife Tana.
From BBC ● Jun. 20, 2026
A grandchild who gets scholarships or attends a less expensive school doesn’t lose out.
From MarketWatch ● Jun. 9, 2026
It’s your grandchild, which is more than any other grandparents it’s got can say for certain.
From "The Sound and the Fury" by William Faulkner
His most recent project involved the crib my husband and I had saved from our sons’ infancy with the hope that grandchildren would one day use it.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 17, 2026
Asahiro Kuni, 81, a member of one of the 11 imperial branches, has also said he would advise his grandchildren to refuse the opportunity of becoming royals.
From Barron's ● Jul. 17, 2026
Residents have been receiving troubling calls from people pretending to be their grandchildren, swindling them out of thousands of dollars.
From Salon ● Jul. 15, 2026
Franklin invited his children and grandchildren to join them and rented a 10-bedroom Airbnb to house them all.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 12, 2026
He's so patient with them; I wonder if he has grandchildren of his own.
From "Girl in the Blue Coat" by Monica Hesse
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.
