iguana
Americannoun
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a large, arboreal lizard, Iguana iguana, native to Central and South America, having stout legs and a crest of spines from neck to tail.
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any of various related lizards of the genera Iguana, Ctenosaura, Conolophus, and Amblyrhynchus.
noun
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either of two large tropical American arboreal herbivorous lizards of the genus Iguana, esp I. iguana ( common iguana ), having a greyish-green body with a row of spines along the back: family Iguanidae
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Also called: iguanid. any other lizard of the tropical American family Iguanidae
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another name for leguaan
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of iguana
1545–55; < Spanish < Arawak iwana
Explanation
An iguana is a big lizard with distinctive spines running down its back. If you keep an iguana as a pet, you'll want to feed it a lot of fresh vegetables. Iguanas look a little intimidating, since they grow as large as six feet long to the tip of the tail and have a head that resembles a dinosaur. While pet iguanas can sometimes be somewhat aggressive, they can be tamed with enough handling. The word iguana is Spanish, and it comes from a West Indies language, Arawak, and its word for this particular kind of lizard, iwana.
Vocabulary lists containing iguana
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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.
Discussing unmade films and dealing with an unruly pet iguana, Panahi renders an illuminating self-portrait.
From Los Angeles Times • Oct. 15, 2025
One of them stuck though - a report of an iguana stuck on the roof of a house.
From BBC • Oct. 3, 2025
A new iguana joins Asia's rich reptile fauna, officially described as new to science in the open-access journal ZooKeys.
From Science Daily • Dec. 27, 2023
During his time at USC from 2012-14, he was known to get around campus on a skateboard, sometimes ferrying around a pet iguana on his shoulder.
From Seattle Times • Nov. 1, 2023
He liked the native cooking so much that once he ate eighty-two iguana eggs at one sitting.
From "One Hundred Years of Solitude" by Gabriel Garcia Marquez
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.
