rod
noun
a stick, wand, staff, or the like, of wood, metal, or other material.
rod
1 American
[rod]
/ rɒd /
noun
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rods
plural
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a stick, wand, staff, or the like, of wood, metal, or other material.
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a straight, slender shoot or stem of any woody plant, whether still growing or cut from the plant.
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(in plastering or mortaring) a straightedge moved along screeds to even the plaster between them.
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a stick used for measuring.
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Archaic. a unit of linear measure, 5.5 yards or 16.5 feet (5.029 meters); linear perch or pole.
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Archaic. a unit of square measure, 30.25 square yards (25.29 sq. m); square perch or pole.
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a stick, or a bundle of sticks or switches bound together, used as an instrument of punishment.
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punishment or discipline.
Not one to spare the rod, I sent him to bed without dinner.
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a wand, staff, or scepter carried as a symbol of office, authority, power, etc.
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authority, sway, or rule, especially when tyrannical.
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a slender bar or tube for draping towels over, suspending a shower curtain, etc.
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Bible. a branch of a family; tribe.
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a pattern, drawn on wood in full size, of one section of a piece of furniture.
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Slang.
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a pistol or revolver.
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Vulgar. the penis.
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Anatomy. one of the rodlike cells in the retina of the eye, sensitive to low intensities of light.
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Bacteriology. a rod-shaped microorganism.
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Also called stadia rod. Also called leveling rod. Surveying. a light pole, conspicuously marked with graduations, held upright and read through a surveying instrument in leveling or stadia surveying.
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Metallurgy. round metal stock for drawing and cutting into slender bars.
verb (used with object)
rodded,
rodding
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to furnish or equip with a rod or rods, especially lightning rods.
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to even (plaster or mortar) with a rod.
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Metallurgy. to reinforce (the core of a mold) with metal rods.
Rod
2
American
[rod]
/ rɒd /
noun
rod
British
/ rɒd /
noun
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a slim cylinder of metal, wood, etc; stick or shaft
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a switch or bundle of switches used to administer corporal punishment
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any of various staffs of insignia or office
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power, esp of a tyrannical kind
a dictator's iron rod
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a straight slender shoot, stem, or cane of a woody plant
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See fishing rod
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Also called: pole. perch.
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a unit of length equal to 5 1/ 2 yards
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a unit of square measure equal to 30 1/ 4 square yards
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a straight narrow board marked with the dimensions of a piece of joinery, as the spacing of steps on a staircase
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a metal shaft that transmits power in axial reciprocating motion Compare shaft
piston rod, con(necting) rod
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surveying another name (esp US) for staff 1
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Also called: retinal rod. any of the elongated cylindrical cells in the retina of the eye, containing the visual purple (rhodopsin), which are sensitive to dim light but not to colour Compare cone
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any rod-shaped bacterium
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a slang word for penis
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slang name for pistol
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short for hot rod
rod
Scientific
/ rŏd /
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One of the rod-shaped cells in the retina of the eye of many vertebrate animals. Rods are more sensitive to light than cones and are responsible for the ability to see in dim light. However, rods are insensitive to red wavelengths of light and do not contribute greatly to the perception of color.
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Compare cone
rod
Idioms
Usage
What else does rod mean? Rod can refer to a stick, handgun, car, parts of the eye, and even, well, the penis, among many other things. ROD can additionally serve as an acronym for the slang expression ride or die.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of rod
before 1150; Middle English rodd, late Old English; akin to Old Norse rudda club
Explanation
A rod is a bar or a stick, like the curtain rods in your windows or the steel rods inside the structure of a building that help make it sturdy. A rod can be a staff, like a walking stick, or a metal bar used in construction projects. In tarot card decks, rods are are a suit that's also known as "wands" or "batons." You fish with a rod too, a long flexible pole. Most parents today disagree with the old-fashioned saying, "Spare the rod and spoil the child," which basically means "your kid will be spoiled if you don't hit them with a stick now and then."
Vocabulary lists containing rod
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:
Hired as the town’s fill-in sheriff—his predecessor having been found dead in his underwear, in the snow, holding a fly rod and an ice auger—Ulysses Richardson does his best to maintain discipline on the force.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 13, 2026
I’ve been a lightning rod for pain a couple of times in my career.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 6, 2026
In the first, the laser was directed onto the top of a cemented carbide rod, with the rod positioned ahead of the direction in which the material was being built.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 4, 2026
But what turned a summer blockbuster into an IMAX-sized lightning rod?
From Slate ● Aug. 3, 2026
Chase began to get a strange feeling about Emily and wondered if this was what his dad experienced when he made his predictions, or what a lightning rod felt just before a strike.
From "Storm Runners" by Roland Smith
Sir Rod also has three dates in his tour schedule for Mexico in September, for which tickets are currently still on sale.
From BBC ● Aug. 12, 2026
"I'm already feeling better and very much on the mend," Sir Rod said on Instagram, external.
From BBC ● Aug. 12, 2026
Former Twins and Angels star Rod Carew, 80, powered through to attend the induction.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 26, 2026
The tribute began with comments from Roddenberry's son Rod, who heads the production and distribution company Roddenberry Entertainment.
From Barron's ● Jul. 26, 2026
The Iron Rod can shrink to the size of a needle, the Sea King had said.
From "When the Sea Turned to Silver" by Grace Lin
While fixing the plastic connectors on his washing machine struts, which are like suspension rods for the appliance, he first printed a test part and then made adjustments before printing the rest.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 15, 2026
A horizontal magnetic field generated a two dimensional flow, while an array of rods was used to disturb it.
From Science Daily ● Jun. 3, 2026
George W. Bush’s administration tried repeatedly to prevent Russia, which was also supplying fuel rods, from actually making Bushehr operational unless Iran guaranteed it would return all spent fuel to Russia.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 27, 2026
A fisherman packed up his rods next to a family picnicking on the waterfront.
From Barron's ● Apr. 22, 2026
The green light filled the cramped hallway, it lit the pram pushed against the wall, it made the banisters glare like lightning rods, and James Potter fell like a marionette whose strings were cut....
From "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" by J.K. Rowling
About 10% of the conduit lines were rodded twice, owing to partial sections having been rodded once before completion.
From Transactions of the American Society of Civil Engineers, vol. LXVIII, Sept. 1910 The Bergen Hill Tunnels. Paper No. 1154 by F. Lavis
The lines were rodded in both directions from alternate manholes, thus avoiding uncoupling the rods and allowing every pull to be effective in pushing the mandrel through the ducts.
From Transactions of the American Society of Civil Engineers, vol. LXVIII, Sept. 1910 The Bergen Hill Tunnels. Paper No. 1154 by F. Lavis
The best continuous work on rodding was done between October 22d and 29th, 1908, when in 7 working days, 105,600 duct ft. were rodded, an average of a little more than 15,000 ft. per day.
From Transactions of the American Society of Civil Engineers, vol. LXVIII, Sept. 1910 The Bergen Hill Tunnels. Paper No. 1154 by F. Lavis
One Forquer, who was Lincoln's opponent, had recently rodded his house—and every one knew it.
From The Life of Abraham Lincoln by Henry Ketcham
"And then she will return with him to India, I take it" She rodded.
From A Rent In A Cloud by Charles James Lever
In his spare time, Mr. Stielow’s fantastical, knee-weakening Camaro restorations — with names like “Tri-Tip” and “the Mule” — inspired an entire rodding movement called Pro Touring.
From New York Times ● Apr. 5, 2023
Thus, in 1930 — long before hot rodding went mainstream after World War II — a hopped-up car was a gow job.
From New York Times ● Nov. 18, 2021
I love that culture of hot rodding and classic cars.
From The Guardian ● Jan. 12, 2021
“We’re returning to the roots of hot rodding, basically, where you’re trying to build something cool with what you had,” Thaemert said.
From Washington Times ● Dec. 16, 2014
The cost, including labor, material, and all tools, for rodding for the whole work was slightly less than 0.2 cent per duct ft.
From Transactions of the American Society of Civil Engineers, vol. LXVIII, Sept. 1910 The Bergen Hill Tunnels. Paper No. 1154 by F. Lavis
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.
