narrow

American  

[nar-oh] / ˈnær oʊ /

adjective

• narrower,
  comparative
• narrowest
  superlative

1. of little breadth or width; not broad or wide; not as wide as usual or expected.

   a narrow path.

2. limited in extent or space; affording little room.

   narrow quarters.

3. limited in range or scope.

   a narrow sampling of public opinion.

4. lacking breadth of view or sympathy, as persons, the mind, or ideas.

   a narrow man, knowing only his professional specialty;

   a narrow mind.

   Synonyms:

   small-minded, shallow, limited, biased

5. with little margin to spare; barely adequate or successful; close.

   a narrow escape.

6. careful, thorough, or minute, as a scrutiny, search, or inquiry.

7. limited in amount; small; meager.

   narrow resources.

8. characterized by limited means; straitened; impoverished.

   Since work was scarce, he soon found himself in narrow circumstances.

9. New England. stingy or parsimonious.

10. Phonetics.

    1. (of a vowel) articulated with the tongue laterally constricted, as the ee of beet, the oo of boot, etc.; tense.

    2. (of a phonetic transcription) utilizing a unique symbol for each phoneme and whatever supplementary diacritics are needed to indicate its subphonemic varieties.

11. (of livestock feeds) proportionately rich in protein.

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verb (used without object)

• narrows,
  present (3rd person singular)
• narrowed,
  past participle,  past
• narrowing
  present participle

1. to decrease in width or breadth.

   This is where the road narrows.

verb (used with object)

• narrows,
  present (3rd person singular)
• narrowed,
  past participle,  past
• narrowing
  present participle

1. to make narrower.

2. to limit or restrict (often followed bydown ): to narrow down a contest to three competitors.

   to narrow an area of search;

   to narrow down a contest to three competitors.

3. to make narrow-minded.

   Living in that village has narrowed him.

noun

1. a narrow part, place, or thing.

2. a narrow part of a valley, passage, or road.

3. (used with a singular or plural verb) narrows, a narrow part of a strait, river, ocean current, etc.

4. the Narrows, a narrow strait from upper to lower New York Bay, between Staten Island and Long Island. 2 miles (3.2 kilometers) long; 1 mile (1.6 kilometers) wide.

narrow British  

/ ˈnærəʊ /

adjective

1. small in breadth, esp in comparison to length

2. limited in range or extent

3. limited in outlook; lacking breadth of vision

4. limited in means or resources; meagre

   narrow resources

5. barely adequate or successful (esp in the phrase a narrow escape )

6. painstakingly thorough; minute

   a narrow scrutiny

7. finance denoting an assessment of liquidity as including notes and coin in circulation with the public, banks' till money, and banks' balances Compare broad

   narrow money

8. dialect overcareful with money; parsimonious

9. phonetics

   1. another word for tense 1

   2. relating to or denoting a transcription used to represent phonetic rather than phonemic distinctions

   3. another word for close 1

10. (of agricultural feeds) especially rich in protein

11. informal an escape only just managed

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verb

1. to make or become narrow; limit; restrict

noun

1. a narrow place, esp a pass or strait

narrow Idioms  

More idioms and phrases containing narrow

• straight and narrow

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Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• narrowness
  noun
• overnarrowness
  noun
• overnarrow
  adjective
• unnarrow
  adjective
• unnarrowed
  adjective
• narrowly
  adverb
• overnarrowly
  adverb
• unnarrowly
  adverb

Inflected Forms

Adjectives

• narrower
  comparative
• narrowest
  superlative

Participles

• narrowing
  present
• narrowed
  past

Conjugated Forms

Present

• narrow
  simple
• narrows
  simple
• have narrowed
  perfect
• has narrowed
  perfect
• am narrowing
  progressive
• are narrowing
  progressive
• is narrowing
  progressive
• have been narrowing
  perfect progressive
• has been narrowing
  perfect progressive

Past

• narrowed
  simple
• had narrowed
  perfect
• was narrowing
  progressive
• were narrowing
  progressive
• had been narrowing
  perfect progressive

Future

• will narrow
  simple
• will have narrowed
  perfect
• will be narrowing
  progressive
• will have been narrowing
  perfect progressive

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Etymology

Origin of narrow

First recorded before 900; Middle English narw(e), nareu(e), narow(e), Old English nearu (inflectional stem nearw- ), cognate with Old Saxon naru “narrow,” Dutch naar “dismal, unpleasant,” Old Saxon naro, naru “narrow, depressing”; possibly akin to German Narbe “scar,” literally, “narrow mark”

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Explanation

Narrow means less wide or to make less wide. When you narrow down your choices, you decrease the number of choices. A road might be too narrow for a car. When used to describe something physical such as a street or hips, narrow simply means not wide. Similarly, with quantities it means not much like when you win your basketball game by a narrow margin. But if you use it to describe an attitude, it has the negative meaning of not wide or open enough. If you're narrow-minded, you don't see the big picture –– sometimes it means you think in narrow stereotypes.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

narrow narrower narrowest narrows narrowed narrowing

But a close look at the rest of the Florida races reveals the culprit in Nixon’s narrow loss.

From Salon ● Nov. 5, 2026

This vote would decide whether to proceed with up to £3bn of initial works and narrow down four current options, ahead of a final decision by 2030.

From BBC ● Nov. 5, 2026

On Tuesday, the Latin Grammy-winning artist defeated Republican incumbent Monica De La Cruz in Congressional District 15, a narrow geographical area that extends east of San Antonio down to Rio Grande Valley.

From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 4, 2026

AI summaries tend to narrow choices to a handful of options, he said, often from older, established brands.

From MarketWatch ● Nov. 3, 2026

I passed under the narrow balconies clinging to the run-down tenements.

From "The Red Car to Hollywood" by Jennie Liu

Still, the results in the state’s Democratic primary were far narrower than the polls showed, with El-Sayed besting Stevens by only 1%, or 14,893 votes.

From Salon ● Nov. 3, 2026

The BOE survey found that 71% of businesses expect the war to lead to narrower profit margins, an indication that they don’t expect to be able to recoup higher costs through higher prices.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 2, 2026

The biggest is planning for a surviving spouse, who could face a smaller standard deduction, narrower tax brackets and higher Medicare premiums.

From MarketWatch ● Nov. 2, 2026

Iotova won 35 percent of the vote in the first round last week, with Gyurov on 32 percent -- a much narrower gap than the 20-point lead for Iotova predicted by opinion polls.

From Barron's ● Nov. 1, 2026

The doorway to the stairs was on the second floor at the end of a long hallway in the vacant western wing, the door itself narrower than the rest and the knob rusted from disuse.

From "Ophie's Ghosts" by Justina Ireland

After touching its narrowest level on record recently, there have been signs that breadth is making a comeback, as more stocks and sectors have turned higher over the past few sessions.

From MarketWatch ● Oct. 6, 2026

The spread between the two-year and 10-year yields reached its narrowest level since March 2025 on Thursday.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 18, 2026

Sitting on Iran's southern coast, close to the narrowest point of the strait, it is home to Iran's Navy and the naval arm of the IRGC.

From BBC ● Jul. 2, 2026

It’s important to appreciate that the students pressed for the narrowest, most modest ruling possible.

From Slate ● Jun. 30, 2026

It is striking, for instance, how many different professions and disciplines have a word to describe the particular gift of reading deeply into the narrowest slivers of experience.

From "Blink" by Malcolm Gladwell

Kathryn Bigelow’s film narrows the Iraq War down to the nerve-shredding work of an explosives-disposal unit, with Renner’s Staff Sgt.

From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 11, 2026

Yet both authors’ concentration on Douglass the constitutional thinker sometimes narrows the man.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 4, 2026

However, the gap narrows at Advanced Higher level with a 1.2 percentage point difference between those with and without ASN.

From BBC ● Aug. 4, 2026

Plaque narrows blood vessels and makes them less flexible, increasing the strain on the cardiovascular system.

From Science Daily ● Aug. 1, 2026

She looks up at me and narrows her eyes.

From "How to Disappear Completely" by Ali Standish

Six Flags Entertainment’s FUN 6.30%increase; up pointing triangle third-quarter loss narrowed but the company warned that the recent fatal accident on a Georgia thrill ride would weigh on fourth-quarter growth.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 5, 2026

When the wandering pooch finally narrowed his territory, Packer set up a humane trap and spent several days and nights nearby, waiting for Anchovy Jack to take the bait.

From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 3, 2026

Ischemic heart disease occurs when reduced blood flow deprives the heart muscle of the oxygen it needs, often because arteries have narrowed or become blocked.

From Science Daily ● Nov. 2, 2026

For the year, the company narrowed its adjusted per-share earnings outlook to between 74 cents and 76 cents, the high end of which is once again in line with analyst views.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 30, 2026

The rope dangled from her fingers, and she narrowed her eyes as the sukkah gave a little shudder.

From Anya and the Nightingale by Sofiya Pasternack

Prosecutors have revised the charges against him, narrowing one count to focus solely on damage from the Lachman fire, which began on Jan. 1, 2025.

From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 4, 2026

But Chief Financial Officer Kevan Parekh projected a narrowing to between 45% and 46% in the current quarter.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 3, 2026

These stable arrangements serve as molecular checkpoints, narrowing the enormous number of possible assembly routes into a much smaller set of successful pathways.

From Science Daily ● Oct. 22, 2026

Some cells begin narrowing their possible futures early, while others remain flexible for a longer period before becoming committed to a specific role.

From Science Daily ● Oct. 13, 2026

In a critical sense, the police officers whom Klinger describes performed better because their senses narrowed: that narrowing allowed them to focus on the threat in front of them.

From "Blink" by Malcolm Gladwell

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