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brad

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brad¹

  • /bɹad/ UK
  • /bɹæd/ US, UK

Rhymes with -æd

Where it comes from

Late Middle English brad, variant of brod(d), from Old Norse broddr (“spike, shaft”), from Proto-Germanic *bruzdaz (compare Old English brord, Old High German brort), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰrusdʰos (compare Welsh brath (“sting, prick”), Albanian bredh (“fir-tree”), Lithuanian bruzdùklis (“bridle”), Czech brzda (“brake”). Doublet of prod.

noun brads

  1. A thin, small nail, with a slight projection at the top on one side instead of a head, or occasionally with a small domed head, similar to that of an escutcheon pin. Into the middle arch of each desk silver-headed brads had been hammered to form a lion, a bear, a ram, a dove, and in the midst a flaming torch.
  2. US A paper fastener, a fastening device formed of thin, soft metal, such as shim brass, with a round head and a flat, split shank, which is spread after insertion in a hole in a stack of pages, in much the same way as a cotter pin or a split rivet.

verb brads · bradding · bradded

  1. transitive To attach using a brad.
  2. transitive To upset the end of a rod inserted in a hole so as to prevent it from being pulled out, as when riveting.

brad²

  • /bɹad/ UK
  • /bɹæd/ US, UK

Rhymes with -æd

noun brads

  1. A binary radian.

Brad³

  • /bɹæd/

Sounds like brad (US) · Rhymes with -æd

Where it comes from

Clipping.

proper noun

  1. A diminutive of the male given names Bradley, Bradly, and Bradford, also used as a formal given name. […] Brad Schimel wants to make sure women don’t have the right to make their own health care decisions. If he wins, that right is gone,” Crawford says in the ad.
  2. A city in Hunedoara County, Romania.

noun Brads

  1. Synonym of Chadlite (“a man of a slightly lower ranking on a scale of physical attractiveness than Chad”) Members then rate the user, with men who are 10/10 deemed "Chads," those just below them "Brads," those who are around 5/10 "normies," and those who are 3/10 or lower "subhuman" or "ogres."

    Similar: Chadlite

Thesaurus

Closest in meaning: awl, nail, rad, bard, burkina, bradley, boris, juan, brian, myers, awls, pin, spike, fastener, stud, tack

Translations

Every language

noun thin finishing nail

Ελληνικάπρόκα próka

name A city in Romania

DeutschTannenhof
RomânăBrad

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Cite this
MLA

"brad." Wiktionary, via Micwyn, micwyn.com/word/brad. Accessed 6 Nov. 2026.

APA

brad. (n.d.). In Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Retrieved November 6, 2026, from https://micwyn.com/word/brad

Chicago

"brad." Wiktionary, via Micwyn. Accessed November 6, 2026. https://micwyn.com/word/brad.

BibTeX
@misc{brad_2026,
  title = {brad},
  howpublished = {Wiktionary, via Micwyn},
  year = {2026},
  url = {https://micwyn.com/word/brad},
  urldate = {2026-11-06}
}