rubbery
Americanadjective
adjective
Etymology
Origin of rubbery
Explanation
Rubbery things have a tough, flexible texture, like a rubbery playground ball or a rubbery piece of American cheese. You'll often find the adjective rubbery describing food that's unpleasant to chew, like rubbery pasta or overcooked, rubbery chicken. Things actually made out of rubber are rubbery too, like a rubbery water balloon or the pair of rubbery gloves your grandma uses for gardening. Rubbery comes from rubber, a noun that originally meant "an eraser made from a tropical plant," or in other words, "a thing that rubs."
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.
Fleming reads unconventional in every way, from his manic and meta delivery to his glam-rock crushed-velvet bodysuit to a rubbery tendency to leap around the stage, no limb left behind.
From Los Angeles Times • May 27, 2026
The food fight that explodes in the play’s third movement is conducted with comestibles so rubbery they might be part of a clown show.
From Los Angeles Times • Mar. 25, 2026
On the Alto K98M, that click-clackiness is muffled by a rubbery internal gasket surrounding the keys.
From The Wall Street Journal • Nov. 23, 2025
The younger cheese was perhaps a bit more rubbery than usual, and the older ones more obviously salty.
From BBC • Jul. 12, 2025
George took the steep steps onto her own bus and shuffled along the narrow corridor, her feet sticking to the rubbery floor.
From "George" by Alex Gino
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.
