to drive or leave (a ship, fish, etc.) aground or ashore.
The receding tide stranded the whale.
(usually used in the passive) to bring into or leave in a helpless position.
He was stranded in the middle of nowhere.
to be driven or left ashore; run aground.
to be halted or struck by a difficult situation.
He stranded in the middle of his speech.
one of a number of fibers, threads, or yarns that are plaited or twisted together to form a rope, cord, or the like.
a similar part of a wire rope.
a rope made of such twisted or plaited fibers.
a fiber or filament, as in animal or plant tissue.
a single strand of messenger RNA.
a thread or threadlike part of anything.
the strands of a plot.
a tress of hair.
a string of pearls, beads, etc.
to form (a rope, cable, etc.) by twisting strands together.
to break one or more strands of (a rope).
Mark, 1934–2014, U.S. poet, born in Canada: U.S. poet laureate 1990–91.
Paul, 1890–1976, U.S. photographer and documentary-film producer.
the, a street parallel to the Thames, in W central London, England: famous for hotels and theaters.
a set of or one of the individual fibres or threads of string, wire, etc, that form a rope, cable, etc
a single length of string, hair, wool, wire, etc
a string of pearls or beads
a constituent element in a complex whole
one strand of her argument
to leave or drive (ships, fish, etc) aground or ashore or (of ships, fish, etc) to be left or driven ashore
(tr; usually passive) to leave helpless, as without transport or money, etc
a shore or beach
a foreign country
First before 1000; Middle English noun strond(e), strand(e), Old English strand; cognate with Dutch strand, German Strand, Old Norse strǫnd; akin to strew
First recorded in 1490–1500; origin uncertain
A single hair, a noodle, even a line of thought — any of these things could be called a strand, a long thin length of something. The noun strand describes things that are long and thin like a rope, or a strand of spaghetti, hair, or thread. Strands are often twisted together to form thicker, stronger things like cables. As a verb, the meaning is very different: "to leave helpless," like unreliable cars that strand their drivers, or a snowstorm that strands people at airports.
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Signing celebrity athletes from popular sports like basketball has become a key strand of that expansion strategy, boosting credibility abroad while appealing to the many NBA fans in the domestic market.
From Barron's • Jul. 3, 2026
The other strand follows his grocery run in Bakersfield.
From Salon • Jun. 30, 2026
The script is by David Koepp of the paranoid thriller “Black Bag” and Spielberg’s 2005 version of “War of the Worlds,” yet, this plot strand about private enterprise isn’t science fiction.
From Los Angeles Times • Jun. 10, 2026
The most dramatic changes occurred when the ruthenium dioxide film reached approximately 4 nanometers thick, which is about the width of a single DNA strand.
From Science Daily • Jun. 6, 2026
She pulled a strand of hair into her mouth, a nervous habit I thought she’d broken years ago.
From "Keep It Together, Keiko Carter" by Debbi Michiko Florence
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.
