Tell

verb tells · telling · told · telled

1. transitive To determine the number, amount, or value of [something]. All told, there were over a dozen.  Can you tell time on a clock?  He had untold wealth.
2. intransitive, transitive To notice, discern. (Roughly, "can tell" means "know" but with a sense of direct perception.) I can tell that you're thrilled.
3. intransitive, transitive To pick up on a difference. (See tell apart for more.) An expert can tell an original from a forgery.
4. ditransitive, transitive To narrate, to recount. I want to tell a story;  I want to tell you a story.
5. ditransitive, transitive To convey by speech; to say. Finally, someone told him the truth.  He seems to like to tell lies.
6. transitive To instruct or inform. Please tell me how to do it.
7. transitive To order; to direct, to say to someone. Tell him to go away.
8. transitive To use (beads or similar objects) as an aid to prayer.
9. childish, intransitive To inform someone in authority about a wrongdoing. I saw you steal those sweets! I'm telling!
10. intransitive To reveal information in prose through outright expository statement — contrasted with show. Maria rewrote the section of her novel that talked about Meg and Sage's friendship to have less telling and more showing.
11. intransitive To show, be showing, be revealed. Cherry looks old, Mergenthaler told himself. His age is telling. Querulous — that's the word. He's become a whining, querulous old man absorbed with trivialities.
12. transitive To reveal. Time will tell what became of him.
13. intransitive To have an effect, especially a noticeable one; to be apparent, to be demonstrated. Sir Gerald was moving slower; his wounds were beginning to tell.
14. intransitive (of a fact) To support a certain position. Opinion ought [… to give] merited honour to every one, whatever opinion he may hold[…]keeping nothing back which tells, or can be supposed to tell, in their favour.

Similar: number, apprise, make known, snitch, tattle

noun tells

1. A reflexive, often habitual behavior, especially one occurring in a context that often features attempts at deception by persons under psychological stress (such as a poker game or police interrogation), that reveals information that the person exhibiting the behavior is attempting to withhold.
2. informal A giveaway; something that unintentionally reveals or hints at a secret. Those whose business it is to verify luxury bags insist, at least publicly, that there’s always a “tell” to a superfake.
3. archaic That which is told; a tale or account. April 4, 1743, Horace Walpole, letter to Sir Horace Mann I am at the end of my tell.
4. Internet A private message to an individual in a chat room; a whisper.

noun tells

1. A hill or mound, originally and especially in the Middle East, over or consisting of the ruins of ancient settlements. Succoth is now associated with a large tell situated in the Jordan Valley, Deir Allah.

proper noun Tells

1. A surname.