hob
1 Americannoun
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a projection or shelf at the back or side of a fireplace, used for keeping food warm.
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a rounded peg or pin used as a target in quoits and similar games.
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a game in which such a peg is used.
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Machinery. a milling cutter for gear and sprocket teeth, splines, threads, etc., having helically arranged teeth and fed across the work as the work is rotated.
verb (used with or without object)
noun
idioms
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raise hob, to cause a destructive commotion; behave disruptively.
They raised such hob with their antagonistic questions that the meeting broke up.
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play hob with, to do mischief or harm to.
The child played hob with my radio, and now it won't work at all.
noun
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the flat top part of a cooking stove, or a separate flat surface, containing hotplates or burners
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a shelf beside an open fire, for keeping kettles, etc, hot
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a steel pattern used in forming a mould or die in cold metal
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a hard steel rotating cutting tool used in machines for cutting gears
verb
noun
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a hobgoblin or elf
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a male ferret
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informal to cause mischief or disturbance
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of hob1
First recorded in 1505–15; variant of obsolete hub “hob (in a fireplace)”; perhaps identical with hub
Origin of hob2
First recorded in 1300–50; Middle English, special use of Hob(be), for Robert or Robin
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:
For Aimee Ludgate, 29, from Bradford, using an oven or hob in this heat is a no-go.
From BBC ● Jun. 25, 2026
Pans are precariously placed on a hob and she is stirring away.
From BBC ● Sep. 23, 2025
Even food residue that collects in the oven or on the hob generates fine particles when burned.
From Salon ● Apr. 24, 2023
The cooker hood removes particles generated from the back rings of a hob more easily than from the front rings, where more pollutants can escape into the room.
From Salon ● Apr. 24, 2023
At first it seems like an owl, but it’s got hob eyes.
From "The Cruel Prince" by Holly Black
In England Davis hobbed so intimately with the nobs that the P.M.,
From Time Magazine Archive
For perhaps 5,500 years man has started off with molten metal, which he has then cast, forged, rolled, extruded, hammered, machined, hobbed, drilled, milled and ground.
From Time Magazine Archive
After the dies are hobbed their front ends should be reamed with a taper reamer as in Fig.
From Modern Machine-Shop Practice, Volumes I and II by Joshua Rose
At time-serving Arthur Wolfe's, for instance, Clare hobbed and nobbed with the disaffected; such, that is, as had not gone so far as to frighten the well-meaning attorney-general.
From My Lords of Strogue, Vol. II (of III) A Chronicle of Ireland, from the Convention to the Union by Lewis Wingfield
In their big rawhide boots, with hobbed soles and steel-shod heels, they pounded back and forth, while the others whooped them on.
From Paths of Glory Impressions of War Written at and Near the Front by Irvin S. (Irvin Shrewsbury) Cobb
However, a worry for Ulster was the sight of Williams hobbing off.
From BBC ● Jan. 11, 2013
They include office buildings, workshops for hobbing, heat-treating, grinding and polishing cog-wheels and the complete gear transmissions.
From Zeppelin The Story of a Great Achievement by Harry Vissering
Striking a match, there was his apron shrouding his hobbing foot.
From London River by H. M. (Henry Major) Tomlinson
But she soon found a cure for his passion, By hobbing or nobbing at dinner, With Paris, a Trojan of fashion.
From The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction Volume 10, No. 284, November 24, 1827 by Various
Every pitch requires a different tool, and the cutting end is given the curved form by milling or hobbing.
From Turning and Boring A specialized treatise for machinists, students in the industrial and engineering schools, and apprentices, on turning and boring methods, etc. by Franklin D. Jones
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.
