shag
1 Americannoun
-
rough, matted hair, wool, or the like.
-
a mass of this.
-
a hairdo in which hair is cut in slightly uneven, overlapping layers downward from the crown, sometimes with the hair at the front and back hairlines left longer or wispier than the rest.
-
a cloth with a nap, as of silk or a heavy or rough woolen fabric.
-
a rug or carpet with a thick, shaggy pile.
-
a coarse tobacco cut into fine shreds.
verb (used with or without object)
noun
-
a small cormorant, Phalacrocorax aristotelis, of European coasts.
-
any of several small cormorants of the Southern Hemisphere.
verb (used without object)
noun
verb (used with or without object)
noun
-
an act or instance of sexual intercourse.
It’s been a while since I’ve had a shag.
-
a sexual partner, or a person considered as a sexual object.
I bet she’d be a good shag.
noun
-
a matted tangle, esp of hair, wool, etc
-
a napped fabric, usually a rough wool
-
shredded coarse tobacco
verb
verb
-
to have sexual intercourse with (a person)
-
to exhaust; tire
noun
noun
-
a cormorant, esp the green cormorant ( Phalacrocorax aristotelis )
-
slang abandoned and alone
Usage
What else does shag mean? Shag means "to have sex" with someone in British slang.
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of shag1
First recorded before 1050; Old English sceacga “(wooly) hair” (not recorded in Middle English ); cognate with Old Norse skegg “beard”; akin to shaw
Origin of shag2
First recorded before 1560–70; perhaps special use of shag 1, applied first to bird's crest
Origin of shag3
First recorded in 1350–1400; perhaps variant of shog
Origin of shag4
First recorded in 1930–35; origin uncertain; see shack 2
Origin of shag5
First recorded in 1780–90; origin unknown
Vocabulary lists containing shag
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’ve always appreciated a fur coat’s timeless and hedonistic glamour, and any lover of ’60s and ’70s fashion needs a shag coat to accompany their nights out in platform boots.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 4, 2025
Now Britons are growing exasperated with a decorator whose tastes run to the intellectual equivalent of avocado-colored appliances and garish shag carpeting.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 13, 2025
Upstairs in Grossman’s office, which is now her architecture studio, she also removed the shag carpeting and replaced it with colorful cork flooring designed to feel like “fallen, random leaves,” she says.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 11, 2025
An era remembered now, if at all, for leisure suits, burnt-orange shag carpeting and muttonchop sideburns, it marked the passage from progress to reaction.
From Salon ● Aug. 9, 2025
Lice Peeking was stretched facedown on the blue shag carpet, and he wasn’t moving.
From "Flush" by Carl Hiaasen
He had visited Camden Yards only once previously — many years ago, he shagged fly balls during batting practice while accompanying his father, then an outfielder for the St. Louis Cardinals.
From Washington Times ● Jul. 27, 2022
Nico shagged flies during batting practice at Comerica Park and spent time in clubhouses much like his dad did as a teen.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 25, 2022
The Blackhawks tied it when Khaira shagged the puck off a bank pass, skated into the zone and fired a wrist shot far side and under Lehner’s right arm at 4:38 of the second.
From Seattle Times ● Jan. 8, 2022
Golfers in those days provided their own practice balls and their caddies shagged them for the player.
From Golf Digest ● Sep. 2, 2019
And then Danny got up and Horace Clarke pitched and Joe Pepitone and I shagged balls in the outfield.
From "The Wednesday Wars" by Gary D. Schmidt
Cubs: OF Cody Bellinger is taking batting practice and shagging balls in the outfield, and he’ll continue to ramp up his baseball activity before a probable rehab stint in the minors.
From Washington Times ● Jun. 7, 2023
“Ryan basically was their little gofer boy,” Kristi said, “running around, shagging balls, running the bases, getting the balls for the big brothers, and he just learned the game very, very young.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 28, 2022
Other times, he will sit down with one after the pitchers come in from their warmups after shagging flyballs.
From Washington Post ● Jun. 23, 2022
He played catch early and then hung out in the outfield with his fellow starting pitchers, shagging balls from batting practice and having casual conversations.
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 27, 2021
Mariners: CF Kyle Lewis is shagging flyballs and ramping up his baseball activities as he works back from a torn right meniscus that has sidelined him since June 1.
From Fox News ● Aug. 24, 2021
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.
