trundle
Americanverb (used with object)
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trundles,
present (3rd person singular)
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trundled,
past participle, past
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trundling
present participle
-
to cause (a circular object) to roll along; roll.
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to convey or move in a wagon, cart, or other wheeled vehicle; wheel.
The farmer trundled his produce to market in a rickety wagon.
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Archaic. to cause to rotate; twirl; spin.
verb (used without object)
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trundles,
present (3rd person singular)
-
trundled,
past participle, past
-
trundling
present participle
-
to roll along.
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to move or run on a wheel or wheels.
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to travel in a wheeled vehicle.
He got into his car and trundled downtown.
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to move or walk with a rolling gait.
noun
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a small wheel, roller, or the like.
-
a lantern wheel.
-
each of the bars of a lantern wheel.
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a truck or carriage on low wheels.
verb
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to move heavily on or as if on wheels
the bus trundled by
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archaic (tr) to rotate or spin
noun
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the act or an instance of trundling
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a small wheel or roller
-
-
the pinion of a lantern
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any of the bars in a lantern pinion
-
-
a small truck with low wheels
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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trundlesimple
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trundlessimple
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have trundledperfect
-
has trundledperfect
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am trundlingprogressive
-
are trundlingprogressive
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is trundlingprogressive
-
have been trundlingperfect progressive
-
has been trundlingperfect progressive
Past
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trundledsimple
-
had trundledperfect
-
was trundlingprogressive
-
were trundlingprogressive
-
had been trundlingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of trundle
First recorded in 1555–65; variant of trindle
Explanation
When you trundle something, you move it or roll it awkwardly. You might have to trundle your broken suitcase down the stairs if you can't find an elevator. When a person trundles, they move slowly and heavily. As a noun, trundle means "a roller," and it usually refers to something on wheels that can be moved around, like a trundle bed, a low bed frame you can slide and store beneath a taller bed. You might roll out the trundle bed when your friend sleeps over, and then try to fall asleep as you listen to your brother trundle around the kitchen looking for a midnight snack.
Vocabulary lists containing trundle
The Lightning Thief
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The Kite Runner
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Uglies
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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:
Private vehicles distribute everything from water and food to toilet paper and soap, while trucks belonging to the World Central Kitchen NGO trundle through the coastal city.
From Barron's ● Jul. 1, 2026
I could have slept several more people in mine, because it included a pull-out couch and trundle bed in addition to the king-size bed.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 16, 2026
Fortunately, for anybody who bought ahead of Friday’s pullback, there is reason to believe stocks could trundle higher in the short term.
From MarketWatch ● May 17, 2026
In the legendary 1939 film “The Women,” New York wives trundle off to Reno, where a six-week residency law lets them divorce their wayward husbands and return home free.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 24, 2024
She had learned, with Izzy’s birth, how your life could trundle along on its safe little track and then, with no warning, skid spectacularly off course.
From "Little Fires Everywhere" by Celeste Ng
If - and it's a big if - it trundles all the way to the bottom, Andy Burnham might become prime minister.
From BBC ● Jan. 22, 2026
As it trundles around an ancient lakebed on Mars, NASA's Perseverance rover is assembling a one-of-a-kind rock collection.
From Science Daily ● Mar. 4, 2024
The six-wheeled, solar-powered rover will rely on the Vikram lander to maintain communications with Earth as it trundles around the landing region for 14 Earth days—or about one period of lunar daylight.
From Scientific American ● Jul. 13, 2023
Stuffed with bugs, frogs, snakes and silly costumes, it trundles along smoothly enough as Robert learns that his likeness has popped up in multiple paintings, once in a Confederate uniform.
From New York Times ● Oct. 6, 2022
Zo drops her strawberry and trundles forward to the edge of Sophia's voluminous gown.
From "The Belles" by Dhonielle Clayton
He shot pool now and then at the Playboy Mansion, collected guns, dyed his white hair jet-black and trundled out anecdotes of Old Hollywood over three-hour lunches.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 30, 2026
A steady stream of trucks trundled past, sometimes drowning out conversation.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 9, 2026
Stocks trundled higher all summer with few interruptions.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 14, 2025
As we talked a train trundled westwards over the river, heading to Prague's Smichov station, and from there onwards to Karlovy Vary, Pilsen or Germany.
From BBC ● Jul. 11, 2025
He loaded them into a crate and onto a handcart and trundled them out of the library, through the front gates, and down the long road that spiraled around Zosimos Ridge.
From "Strange the Dreamer" by Laini Taylor
Euphemistically known as “mobile lounges,” these hulking, 40-ton machines from the 1960s and ’70s look and feel like paramilitary vehicles trundling through a desert dystopia.
From Slate ● Aug. 18, 2026
Buses are infrequent and haphazard, while the subway has only six trundling lines radiating out from the centre, making connections impossible without going all the way in and then all the way out again.
From Barron's ● May 27, 2026
As a child, Plant recalls trundling in his family’s car through interesting, evocative landscapes and, “Misty Mountains that actually were misty mountains,” he says, making another of his not-infrequent Zeppelin asides.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 20, 2025
Mr. Chen shows the family trundling in a horse-drawn cart toward forbidding mountains wreathed in mist.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 9, 2025
After two years of trundling and triangulating his way across France, in 1669 he announced a more accurate measure of 110.46 kilometers for one degree of arc.
From "A Short History of Nearly Everything" by Bill Bryson
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.
