travel
Americanverb (used without object)
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travels,
present (3rd person singular)
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traveled,
past participle, past
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travelled,
past participle, past (especially British)
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traveling,
present participle
-
travelling
present participle (especially British)
-
to go from one place to another, as by car, train, plane, or ship; take a trip; journey.
to travel for pleasure.
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to move or go from one place or point to another.
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to proceed or advance in any way.
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to go from place to place as a representative of a business firm.
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to associate or consort.
He travels in a wealthy crowd.
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Informal. to move with speed.
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to pass, or be transmitted, as light or sound.
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Basketball. (of a player in possession of the ball) to take more than two steps without dribbling or passing the ball.
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to move in a fixed course, as a piece of mechanism.
verb (used with object)
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travels,
present (3rd person singular)
-
traveled,
past participle, past
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travelled,
past participle, past (especially British)
-
traveling,
present participle
-
travelling
present participle (especially British)
-
to travel, journey, or pass through or over, as a country or road.
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to journey or traverse (a specified distance).
We traveled a hundred miles.
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to cause to journey; ship.
to travel logs downriver.
noun
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the act of traveling; journeying, especially to distant places.
to travel to other planets.
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travels,
-
to set out on one's travels.
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journeys as the subject of a written account or literary work.
a book of travels.
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such an account or work.
-
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the coming and going of persons or conveyances along a way of passage; traffic.
an increase in travel on state roads.
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Basketball. an instance of traveling with the ball.
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Machinery.
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the complete movement of a moving part, especially a reciprocating part, in one direction, or the distance traversed; stroke.
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length of stroke.
-
-
movement or passage in general.
to reduce the travel of food from kitchen to table.
adjective
verb
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to go, move, or journey from one place to another
he travels to improve his mind
she travelled across France
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(tr) to go, move, or journey through or across (an area, region, etc)
he travelled the country
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to go, move, or cover a specified or unspecified distance
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to go from place to place as a salesman
to travel in textiles
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(esp of perishable goods) to withstand a journey
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(of light, sound, etc) to be transmitted or move
the sound travelled for miles
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to progress or advance
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basketball to take an excessive number of steps while holding the ball
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(of part of a mechanism) to move in a fixed predetermined path
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informal to move rapidly
that car certainly travels
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informal (often foll by with) to be in the company (of); associate
noun
-
-
the act of travelling
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( as modifier )
a travel brochure
-
-
(usually plural) a tour or journey
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the distance moved by a mechanical part, such as the stroke of a piston
-
movement or passage
Spelling
The word travel has come to exemplify a common spelling quandary: to double or not to double the final consonant of a verb before adding the ending that forms the past tense ( –ed ) or the ending that forms the present-participle ( –ing. ) We see it done both ways—sometimes with the same word ( travel, traveled, traveling; travel, travelled, travelling ). As readers, we accept these variations without even thinking about them. But as writers, we need to know just when we should double that final consonant and when we should not. Because American practice differs slightly from British practice, there is no one answer. But there are well-established conventions. In American writing, when you have a one-syllable verb that ends with a single vowel followed by a single consonant, and you want to add a regular inflectional ending that begins with a vowel, you double that final consonant before adding -ed or -ing : stop, stopped, stopping; flag, flagged, flagging. This principle also holds for verbs of more than one syllable if the final syllable is stressed: permit, permitted, permitting; refer, referred, referring. If that syllable is not stressed, there is no doubling of the final consonant: gallop, galloped, galloping; travel, traveled, traveling. British spelling conventions are similar. They deviate from American practices only when the verb ends with a single vowel followed by an l . In that case, no matter the stress pattern, the final l gets doubled. Thus British writing has repel, repelled, repelling (as would American writing, since the final syllable is stressed). But it also has travel, travelled, travelling and cancel, cancelled, cancelling, since in the context of British writing the verb’s final l, not its stress pattern, is the determining factor. Verbs ending in other consonants have the same doubling patterns that they would have in American writing. An outlier on both sides of the Atlantic is the small group of verbs ending in -ic and one lonely -ac verb. They require an added k before inflectional endings in order to retain the appropriate “hard” sound of the letter c : panic, panicked, panicking; frolic, frolicked, frolicking; shellac, shellacked, shellacking. Canadians, of course, are free to use either British or American spellings.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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pretravelnoun
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outtravelverb (used with object)
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nontravelingadjective
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nontravellingadjective
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travelableadjective
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untravelingadjective
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untravellingadjective
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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travelsimple
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travelssimple
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have traveledperfect
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have travelledperfect
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has traveledperfect
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has travelledperfect
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am travelingprogressive
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am travellingprogressive
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are travelingprogressive
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are travellingprogressive
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is travelingprogressive
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is travellingprogressive
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have been travelingperfect progressive
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have been travellingperfect progressive
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has been travelingperfect progressive
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has been travellingperfect progressive
Past
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traveledsimple
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travelledsimple
-
had traveledperfect
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had travelledperfect
-
was travelingprogressive
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was travellingprogressive
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were travelingprogressive
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were travellingprogressive
-
had been travelingperfect progressive
-
had been travellingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of travel
First recorded in 1250–1300; Middle English (Northern and Scots), originally the same word as travail (by semantic change from “to toil, labor,” then “to make a laborious journey,” then “to journey,” a change that did not occur in French and other Romance languages); spelling travel is due to an accent shift in the 14th century
Explanation
To travel is the act of going from one place to another, usually a considerable distance. Your daily commute in the morning doesn't generally count as travel. Your trip to Timbuktu? That counts. Travel can also be used as a noun — as in your travels to Timbuktu. Or perhaps you prefer time travel or space travel. Objects that are especially adapted for use when you travel are often modified by the word travel; for example, a "travel-bag," "travel- games," or a "travel iron." And if something is particularly popular in another country or culture from its place of origin, say a cheese, a wine, or a type of music, it's said to "travel well."
Vocabulary lists containing travel
"Mysteries of the Ancient Past"
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"Escaping to Freedom" and "Follow the Drinking Gourd"
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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:
People can use Muse to book travel, budget and shop online.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 29, 2026
Nili also said that the court imposed a two-year travel ban and has barred Panahi from using social media for two years.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 29, 2026
The union had already called a strike for Thursday in a bid to ensure that "urgency to travel is never prioritised over safety".
From BBC ● Oct. 29, 2026
The researchers determined that incoming space rocks pass through seven distinct phases as they travel through the atmosphere.
From Science Daily ● Oct. 29, 2026
“Um … maybe I should go now? I need to travel to Yonder. To find my family.”
From "Rump: The (Fairly) True Story of Rumpelstilskin" by Liesl Shurtliff
Superconductors can carry electrical current without any resistance, eliminating the energy losses that normally occur as electricity travels through conventional materials.
From Science Daily ● Oct. 25, 2026
In the world's most populous country, the need for high-end hospitality workers is immense, fuelled by economic growth and the rise of a middle class that travels more and increasingly eats at plush establishments.
From Barron's ● Oct. 23, 2026
In this video, WSJ travels to construction sites, analyzes satellite images and reviews legal filings to explain what comes next for the multibillion-dollar project.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 22, 2026
When Perseverance travels toward the Sun, mission planners currently stop driving by mid-afternoon to avoid these problems.
From Science Daily ● Oct. 21, 2026
Behind his desk, a bookshelf displays artifacts and gifts people have given him during his travels around the world.
From "The Wrong Way Home" by Kate O’Shaughnessy
Jubilant crowds greeted her motorcade, which traveled through Venezuela upon her return.
From Barron's ● Oct. 29, 2026
One real insight that Mr. Ocker offers is how readily Irving’s character has traveled.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 28, 2026
The elder Bolsonaro also traveled to Florida on the eve of Lula’s inauguration in December 2022 after losing the election.
From Salon ● Oct. 28, 2026
Dani Schrire and his wife work in academia and had traveled from Jerusalem just to attend the Tel Aviv demonstration.
From Slate ● Oct. 28, 2026
Wes has traveled somewhere else in his mind, leaving us in the room without him.
From "Split the Sky" by Marie Arnold
Rimac immediately contacted police, used the car's telemetry system to track its location as it travelled towards Slovenia and set off in his Porsche 911 in hot pursuit.
From Barron's ● Oct. 29, 2026
At 17, she travelled to an IS-controlled area of Syria in late 2016 or early 2017, via Russia and Turkey.
From Barron's ● Oct. 27, 2026
After the Oslo talks, Witkoff travelled to Saint Petersburg to meet Putin.
From Barron's ● Oct. 27, 2026
Prosecutors argued that he had not travelled to Algeria to carry out journalistic work, but to commit a hostile act.
From BBC ● Oct. 27, 2026
She travelled into the stratosphere on an exhibition trip, where the sky turned deep purple and the stars came out and the misty earth below looked like a huge concave bowl.
From "I, Robot" by Isaac Asimov
Its rivers, wetlands, forests, and grasslands would have offered dependable sources of water, vegetation, and animal life for populations traveling through the region.
From Science Daily ● Oct. 29, 2026
Meanwhile, the large Perseverance Rover landed on Mars in 2021 and set an off-world driving record by traveling 28 miles while collecting rock and atmosphere samples.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 28, 2026
And of course, traveling has gotten more expensive.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 28, 2026
Salvation arrived in the form of a traveling companion who, inexplicably, had packed a French press.
From Salon ● Oct. 28, 2026
Or those traveling from Arkansas or up from Louisiana?
From "Will’s Race for Home" by Jewell Parker Rhodes
Four men were arrested at a bus station in a nearby village, and the fifth was caught while he was travelling in a tuk-tuk.
From BBC ● Oct. 29, 2026
Puente said he did not know how fast the Renfe train was travelling at the time of the collision, adding that speeds on that section of track could reach 200 kilometres per hour.
From Barron's ● Oct. 29, 2026
Around 200 passengers who paid to live on a cruise ship while travelling the world were abruptly left in a Cambodian port after the company ran out of money, an official said on Wednesday.
From Barron's ● Oct. 28, 2026
Eduarda was also on the stationary train, travelling with her two cats.
From BBC ● Oct. 28, 2026
It was plain that many people regarded them now as the companions of a travelling magician of unknown powers and purpose.
From "The Fellowship of the Ring" by J.R.R. Tolkien
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