whale

¹ American  

[wayl, hwayl] / weɪl, ʰweɪl /

noun

• whales,
  plural
• whale
  plural

1. any of the larger marine mammals of the order Cetacea, especially as distinguished from the smaller dolphins and porpoises, having a fishlike body, forelimbs modified into flippers, and a head that is horizontally flattened.

2. Informal. something big, great, or fine of its kind.

   I had a whale of a time in Europe.

   Programming this game turned out to be a whale of a project.

3. Also called crypto whale. an investor who holds a large amount of cryptocurrency and is therefore able to create noticeable effects on the market, as by influencing prices through large transactions or by reducing the amount of available cryptocurrency through failure to move their holdings.

   The recent accumulation of this cryptocurrency by whales may indicate that they expect it to see significant gains in the near future.

4. Astronomy. Whale, the constellation Cetus.

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verb (used without object)

whaled, whaling

1. to engage in whaling or whale fishing.

2. Digital Technology. to phish by posing as a company’s attorney, CEO, vendor, or other authorized entity in order to scam a payroll department, corporate executive, etc., out of money or confidential information.

   When she demonstrated her project, “How to Whale and Make Millions,” they didn’t know whether to award her or arrest her!

verb (used with object)

whaled, whaling

1. Digital Technology. to make (a company’s employee or department) a phishing victim by posing as an entity authorized to procure money or confidential information from the company.

   Before proving he had been whaled, the marketing VP was subjected to much scrutiny and suspicion.

whale ² American  

[hwayl, wayl] / ʰweɪl, weɪl /

verb

whaled, whaling

1. to hit, thrash, or beat soundly.

   Back then, if we misbehaved, Dad would threaten to whale us.

   We took advantage of the other team where they were weakest and whaled the stuffing out of them.

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verb phrase

1. whale (away) at / on

   1. to work vigorously and continuously at or on.

      It was cool to see this bunch of talented writers whaling away on their screenplay.

      I remember whaling at code over and over, pretty much at random, until I found something that sort of worked.

   2. to strike with furious and repeated blows.

      Satisfying as it was to whale on the punching bag, it did little to restore my emotional balance.

      In the last round, he pinned his opponent in the corner and was whaling away at him with both hands.

   3. to criticize vehemently.

      When hostile people are whaling on your ideas, it’s easy to feel humiliated and angry.

      Now all the political pundits are whaling away at the president for neglecting the military.

   4. to play (an instrument) with abandon.

      There was a jazz musician in the corner of the bar, whaling away at the piano.

      He and his band whaled on their instruments with their whole bodies—it was amazing!

whale ¹ British  

/ weɪl /

noun

1. any of the larger cetacean mammals, excluding dolphins, porpoises, and narwhals. They have flippers, a streamlined body, and a horizontally flattened tail and breathe through a blowhole on the top of the head

2. any cetacean mammal See also toothed whale whalebone whale

3. slang a gambler who has the capacity to win and lose large sums of money in a casino

4. informal an exceptionally large, fine, etc, example of a (person or thing)

   we had a whale of a time on holiday

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whale ² British  

/ weɪl /

verb

1. (tr) to beat or thrash soundly

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• whale
  plural
• whales
  plural

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Etymology

Origin of whale¹

First recorded before 900; Middle English; Old English hwæl; cognate with German Wal- in Walfisch, Old Norse hvalr; akin to Latin squalus, a kind of fish; 2005–10 whale ¹ for defs. 6, 7 (from the consideration of the victim as a “big fish/phish”)

Origin of whale²

First recorded in 1780–90; origin uncertain

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Explanation

A whale is a large mammal that lives in the ocean. Whales need to breathe air periodically, and the blowholes on their heads help them do this. Blue whales are the largest animals that ever lived — they're even bigger than the largest dinosaurs were! The Old English root of whale means both "whale" and "walrus," although these two marine animals are quite different from each other. While some whales grow to be only ten feet long, many whales are enormous. The informal phrase "a whale of a" comes from the idea that whales are impressive, and you can use it for things (or people) that really distinguish themselves: "Wow, this is a whale of a party!"

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

whale whales whaled whaling

Those like Green, who are concerned over cryptographic algorithms collapsing under AI innovation, worry that somewhere out there in the world of mathematics is an as-yet-undiscovered white whale.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 6, 2026

“We’re setting sail, comin’ ’round the horn / The white whale, gonna let it go,” he sings on the Stonesy “Phantom Limb.”

From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 3, 2026

Morgan said "it was complete luck" that he captured the whale feeding and swimming with dolphins on his drone while fishing with a friend.

From BBC ● Oct. 20, 2026

Learn about whale biology: If you’ve seen or heard of the movie Whalefall, in which a scuba diver is swallowed by a whale, you have probably wondered whether the premise is at all plausible.

From Slate ● Oct. 19, 2026

The second mate had fought the idea like a harpooned whale, but he had had to learn, in self-defense.

From "Carry On, Mr. Bowditch" by Jean Lee Latham

Not just because they towered overhead, the biggest dwarfing a stack of 10 blue whales.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 30, 2026

As gray whales endure an epic roundtrip journey of 10,000 miles or more, the Golden State holds a prime seat.

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 28, 2026

Another challenge also looms: federal regulations aimed at protecting endangered North Atlantic right whales, which migrate along the East Coast and risk entanglement in the vertical lines from lobster traps to surface buoys.

From Barron's ● Oct. 24, 2026

Enjoy your night, and watch out for hungry whales!

From Slate ● Oct. 19, 2026

“And when I finally went back in the water and saw the whales today, I realized how much I had missed it. How happy it made me.”

From "The Boy Who Met a Whale" by Nizrana Farook

Numbers of these 16-foot-long marine mammals, hunted for their oil, meat, and baleen, had fallen to an estimated low of 1,200 animals in the North Pacific—a heavily whaled region—by the 1960s.

From National Geographic ● Sep. 28, 2023

Today’s blue whales find themselves in a whaled and warming ocean.

From Scientific American ● Jul. 31, 2020

Facing Erin's 7,800-plus yards but massively wide fairways—60 yards in some cases—players whaled away with impunity when typical winds failed to blow.

From Golf Digest ● Jun. 4, 2018

Sock, whose nicknames are "J Sizzle" and "Showtime," whaled away on everything.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 26, 2014

The Indians whaled from canoes before the white man came, and a few Indians, Eskimos, and French Canadians are whaling from canoes to-day.

From All Afloat A Chronicle of Craft and Waterways by William Charles Henry Wood

This includes for the animals living in these "chemosynthetic" communities, whose numbers had been thought to have been drastically reduced by human whaling, she added.

From Barron's ● Jun. 10, 2026

Even decades later, the legacy of whaling continues to shape whale populations, affecting not only how many whales exist today but also which males succeed in fathering calves.

From Science Daily ● Mar. 5, 2026

Compared to the sleek, minimalist driving environment of a Tesla Model Y, the Crosstrek’s looks like the helm of a whaling ship.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 23, 2026

California’s gray whales have been considered an environmental success story since the passage of the 1972 Marine Mammal Protection Act and 1986’s global ban on commercial whaling.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 8, 2026

The seals and penguins might not last, and even if they made it to summer, whaling ships rarely came anywhere near Elephant Island: no one knew to look for them there.

From "Shipwreck at the Bottom of the World" by Jennifer Armstrong

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Related Words

• mammal
• porpoise

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