ice skate
noun
ice skate
1 American
ice-skate
2
American
[ahys-skeyt]
/ ˈaɪsˌskeɪt /
verb (used without object)
-
ice-skates,
present (3rd person singular)
-
ice-skated,
past participle, past
-
ice-skating
present participle
ice skate
British
noun
-
a boot having a steel blade fitted to the sole to enable the wearer to glide swiftly over ice
-
the steel blade on such a boot or shoe
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
ice-skatesimple
-
ice-skatessimple
-
have ice-skatedperfect
-
has ice-skatedperfect
-
am ice-skatingprogressive
-
are ice-skatingprogressive
-
is ice-skatingprogressive
-
have been ice-skatingperfect progressive
-
has been ice-skatingperfect progressive
Past
-
ice-skatedsimple
-
had ice-skatedperfect
-
was ice-skatingprogressive
-
were ice-skatingprogressive
-
had been ice-skatingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of ice skate1
First recorded in 1895–1900
Origin of ice-skate2
First recorded in 1945–50; v. use of ice skate
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:
“I love physical challenges. I’ve had to learn how to sword fight, ice skate, shoot a pistol, taekwondo, horseback riding. It’s like practicing to be this other person, and it kind of rubs off.”
From Los Angeles Times ● May 13, 2026
We have watched Joe learn to ice skate in Dancing on Ice and Stacey declutter homes in Sort Your Life Out.
From BBC ● Mar. 25, 2025
April was an energetic young mother who loved to move, and she and Hunter would bike near the river, rollerblade, and ice skate together.
From Slate ● Oct. 15, 2024
“I used to ice skate here,” Bridget said as we came to the mall’s central court.
From Washington Post ● Feb. 6, 2023
“Squirrels are fast. I’ll take the cookies instead, and I’ll ice skate the whole way.”
From "The Benefits of Being an Octopus" by Ann Braden
She adored teaching their daughter to ice-skate and would walk alongside her as she Rollerbladed.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 4, 2026
Ten years earlier, when The Apprentice was still airing new episodes and you could ice-skate and golf at Trump-branded spots across the five boroughs, the same unit was purchased for $16.5 million.
From Slate ● Feb. 21, 2024
Before you can play hockey, you need to be able to ice-skate comfortably.
From Seattle Times ● Feb. 25, 2022
How does a Dalek put on an ice-skate?
From The Guardian ● Sep. 17, 2010
He even taught Mustafa how to ice-skate when he was little.
From "Amina's Voice" by Hena Khan
As well as the perfume atomiser, Florjancic's inventions include plastic ice-skates and the plastic photographic slide frame.
From BBC ● Nov. 20, 2020
From Monte Carlo he moved to Villach, Austria, in 1963, where he would invent plastic ice-skates and the plastic photographic slide frame.
From BBC ● Apr. 12, 2011
The two presents that Sunny Boy liked most were a little pocket searchlight and his ice-skates.
From Sunny Boy and His Playmates by Howard L. (Howard Livingston) Hastings
L. C. Hamlin, Grand Junction, Mich., a U.S. flag 5 feet by 3 feet and a pair of extension, nickel-plated ice-skates for a watch.
From Golden Days for Boys and Girls Volume XIII, No. 51: November 12, 1892 by James Elverson
The youth carried two pairs of ice-skates slung over his shoulder; as he entered the room he flung them clattering to the floor.
From The Girl in the Golden Atom by Ray Cummings
In the Pacific Northwest, some residents ice-skated on frozen streets in Seattle and Portland.
From BBC ● Dec. 24, 2022
“We have never ice-skated before so for us, this is better,” said Bibi Haniff, who is from Guyana and was visiting New York and the William Vale rink with her young daughter and son.
From New York Times ● Feb. 1, 2020
I have swum in the Potomac, ice-skated on the Potomac, kayaked in the Potomac, rock-climbed along the Potomac, run along the Potomac, paddleboarded the Potomac, and just sat and listened along the Potomac.
From Washington Post ● Mar. 11, 2016
But it also helped that Mr. Breyer’s and Mr. Thurmond’s daughters were best friends and ice-skated together.
From New York Times ● Nov. 29, 2015
I ice-skated in my socks down the dustless linoleum hallway.
From "Winger" by Andrew Smith
In the movie, Panettiere plays Gen Harwood, an archetypal most-popular-girl-in-school and less-than-standard teenage ice-skating prodigy.
From Salon ● Aug. 18, 2026
It’s a lifestyle not entirely dissimilar to the rigorous training of an ice-skating prodigy, putting in the work at all hours to hone their skill.
From Salon ● Aug. 18, 2026
By 1953 one theater that was showing “Mr. Scoutmaster,” starring Clifton Webb, even featured an ice-skating show on its custom-built rink.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 2, 2026
Surrounded by residential towers, this ordinary patch of asphalt at 11th Street and South Grand Avenue, smaller than an ice-skating rink, may soon become a public park.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 1, 2024
TeLinde, one of the top cervical cancer experts in the country, was a dapper and serious fifty-six-year-old surgeon who walked with an extreme limp from an ice-skating accident more than a decade earlier.
From "The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks" by Rebecca Skloot
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.
