slime
Americannoun
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slimes
plural
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thin, glutinous mud.
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any ropy or viscous liquid matter, especially of a foul kind.
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a viscous secretion of animal or vegetable origin.
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Also called slimeball. Slang. a repulsive or despicable person.
verb (used with object)
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slimes,
present (3rd person singular)
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slimed,
past participle, past
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sliming
present participle
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to cover or smear with or as if with slime.
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to remove slime from, as fish for canning.
noun
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soft thin runny mud or filth
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any moist viscous fluid, esp when noxious or unpleasant
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a mucous substance produced by various organisms, such as fish, slugs, and fungi
verb
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to cover with slime
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to remove slime from (fish) before canning
Usage
What else does slime mean? What’s up, slime? Slime is slang for a (usually male) "friend," often used as a term of address, like dude or bro.
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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slimesimple
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slimessimple
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have slimedperfect
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has slimedperfect
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am slimingprogressive
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are slimingprogressive
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is slimingprogressive
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have been slimingperfect progressive
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has been slimingperfect progressive
Past
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slimedsimple
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had slimedperfect
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was slimingprogressive
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were slimingprogressive
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had been slimingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of slime
before 1000; Middle English slyme, Old English slīm; cognate with Dutch slijm, German Schleim, Old Norse slīm
Explanation
Slime is a substance that's slippery, damp, and gooey, like the slime that grows on the bottom on a swimming pool if it's not cleaned often enough. People are generally disgusted by slime, so if your dinner guest comments that your famous spinach soufflé looks like slime, you'll probably feel insulted. Like your spinach soufflé, slime is usually greenish in color, though the clear stuff a snail leaves behind is slime too. If you slime something, you cover it in a slimy substance. Experts believe that slime comes from the Old English lim, "sticky substance," which shares a root with the Russian slimak, or "snail."
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:
Only a few days after the pool was refilled, though, it reverted what it always is: a filthy slime pit that nevertheless does an adequate job of its primary objective: reflecting.
From Slate ● Jun. 19, 2026
Glow worms, slime moulds and rare lichens are among 1,109 species discovered in just one corner of Scotland's rainforest.
From BBC ● May 21, 2026
Others are much larger and multicellular, such as kelp, slime molds, and red algae.
From Science Daily ● May 7, 2026
When slime, fidget spinners and other tactile toys started catching on, the company looked to create a product that could compete.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 28, 2026
Leaves fall into the lake and dissolve into slime.
From "Black Swan Green" by David Mitchell
To this day, many biological slimes haven’t been researched enough to know the details of their structure and behavior.
From Scientific American ● Jan. 28, 2023
Familiar monsters, from slimes to sabercats, abound, but now the kids can recruit the beasts to help them hunt for loot.
From Seattle Times ● Dec. 5, 2022
When they got home, Jackson’s little girl combined their two slimes into one.
From Washington Post ● Jun. 30, 2022
It's a pure troll, meant to be so beyond the pale that even responding to it slimes the person falsely accused.
From Salon ● Apr. 20, 2022
It seems that one of Ebola’s paths goes from the dead to the living, winding in trickles of uncoagulated blood and slimes that come out of the dead body.
From "The Hot Zone" by Richard Preston
In his lead single for the album, the musician used a photo of Halle Berry being slimed at the Kids Choice Awards without her consent.
From Salon ● Oct. 11, 2023
He was selected the AFC’s defensive player of the week Wednesday and got slimed leaving practice Thursday after being chosen Nickelodeon’s “NFL Slimetime NVP.”
From Seattle Times ● Nov. 12, 2021
Even Dwight D. Eisenhower, an enormously popular president, was afraid to take on McCarthy directly, even after he slimed Gen. George C. Marshall, Ike’s beloved mentor.
From Washington Post ● Aug. 27, 2020
But I’m not sure why the same contemporary critics who slimed “Olympia” now get to have the definitive word on which Manets matter most.
From New York Times ● Aug. 1, 2019
His hatred of her slimed in his stomach and threatened to become vomit.
From "The Bluest Eye" by Toni Morrison
There are close-ups of hands kneading dough, a snail sliming its way up a window and Cathy prodding a jellied fish with her finger.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 11, 2026
Mr. Parnell, a decorated Army veteran of the war in Afghanistan, has denied wrongdoing and called on his rival to quit the GOP primary race for sliming his family.
From Washington Times ● Sep. 9, 2021
“They’re quick. They’re meditative. From the whispering to the slurping to the sliming to the folding. This is entirely tactile work to this entire generation that’s entirely screenal.”
From Washington Post ● Nov. 6, 2018
But basic cable package viewers at home were immune to the smell, and the response from people who saw the sliming was overwhelmingly positive.
From The Verge ● Aug. 23, 2017
The beast’s green tongue rasped across her visor, sliming the lower section.
From "Artemis Fowl" by Eoin Colfer
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.
