Pronunciations (3)
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/ˈsɪŋɡl̩/
Pronunciation notes
- Received-Pronunciation
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/ˈsɪŋɡəl/
Pronunciation notes
- General-American
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ˈsɪŋɡəl
Adjective
Not accompanied by anything else; one in number.
Usage- not-comparable
- Examples
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Can you give me a single reason not to leave right now?
The vase contained a single long-stemmed rose.
More examples (1)
The single-imaging optic of the mammalian eye offers some distinct visual advantages. Such lenses can take in photons from a wide range of angles, increasing light sensitivity. They also have high spatial resolution, resolving incoming images in minute detail. It’s therefore not surprising that most cameras mimic this arrangement.
Not divided in parts.
Usage- not-comparable
- Examples
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The potatoes left the spoon and landed in a single big lump on the plate.
Designed for the use of only one.
Usage- not-comparable
- Examples
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a single room
Performed by one person, or one on each side.
Usage- not-comparable
- Examples
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a single combat
These shifts refuted, answer thy appellant, […] / Who now defies thee thrice to single fight.
Not married, and (in modern times) not dating or without a significant other.
Usage- not-comparable
- Synonyms
- Examples
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Forms often ask if a person is single, married, divorced, or widowed. In this context, a person who is dating someone but who has never married puts "single".
Josh put down that he was a single male on the dating website.
More examples (3)
To undergo such maiden pilgrimage. But earthlier happy is the rose distilled Than that which, withering on the virgin thorn, Grows, lives, and dies in single blessedness.
Single chose to live, and shunned to wed.
Now I live a single life and I find it's another world / I'm not even the same, I'm a different girl / Yesterday I was somebody's baby / Now today I'm a woman on my own
Having only one rank or row of petals.
Usage- not-comparable
Simple and honest; sincere, without deceit.
Usage- not-comparable
- Obsolete
- Examples
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Therefore, when thyne eye is single: then is all thy boddy full off light. Butt if thyne eye be evyll: then shall all thy body be full of darknes?
I speak it with a single heart.
Uncompounded; pure; unmixed.
Usage- not-comparable
- Examples
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simple ideas are opposed to complex , and single ideas to compound.
More examples (1)
The most that is required is, that the passage of Scripture, selected as the foundation of the sacred oration, should, like the oration itself, be single, full, and unsuperfluous in its character.
Simple; foolish; weak; silly.
Usage- not-comparable
- Obsolete
- Examples
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He utters such single matter in so infantly a voice.
Noun
A vinyl record with one song on side A and one on side B, usually 7 inches in diameter and played at 45 RPM.
- Antonyms
A popular song released and sold (on any format) nominally on its own though usually having at least one extra track.
- Examples
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The Offspring released four singles from their most recent album.
One who is not married or does not have a romantic partner.
- Antonyms
- Examples
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He went to the party, hoping to meet some friendly singles there.
A score of one run.
- Examples
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He refused to take a single as the ball was dropped by his opponent's best fielder.
A hit in baseball where the batter advances to first base.
A tile that has a different value (i.e. number of pips) at each end.
A bill valued at $1.
Usage- US usage
- Informal
- Examples
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I don't have any singles, so you'll have to make change.
She looked in her purse, found a ten and a single, gave him the ten. ‘I'll spend it on booze,’ he said.
A one-way ticket.
Usage- UK usage
- Examples
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More examples (1)
‘I want to know, Mr Stone, if, in the course of the day, you have issued any tickets to a person dressed in Arab costume?’ His reply was prompt. ‘I have — by the last train, the 7.25, — three singles.’
A score of one point, awarded when a kicked ball is dead within the non-kicking team's end zone or has exited that end zone.
Usage- Canadian
- Synonyms
A game with one player on each side, as in tennis.
Usage- in-plural
- Examples
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After tea, Mrs. Inglethorp went to lie down to rest before her efforts in the evening and I challenged Mary Cavendish to a single at tennis.
One of the reeled filaments of silk, twisted without doubling to give them firmness.
A handful of gleaned grain.
Usage- Scotland
- UK usage
- dialectal
A floating-point number having half the precision of a double-precision value.
- Examples
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If you want to be a scientist or an engineer, learn to say “no” to singles and floats.
A shot of only one character.
- Examples
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More examples (1)
But if the same scene is shot in singles (or “over-the-shoulder” shots where one of the actors is only a lumpy shoulder in the foreground), the editor and the director can almost redirect the scene on film.
A single cigarette.
Synonym of single-driver.
Usage- Obsolete
- Examples
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More examples (1)
A few such examples have been preserved, as is well known, such as one of the Stirling 8-ft. singles of the late Great Northern Railway, the Great Western 4-4-0 City of Truro, ex-Caledonian single-driver No. 123, the Brighton 0-4-2 Gladstone, and others.
Verb
To get a hit that advances the batter exactly one base.
- Examples
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Pedro singled in the bottom of the eighth inning, which, if converted to a run, would put the team back into contention.
To thin out.
- Examples
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Paul went joyfully, and spent the afternoon helping to hoe or to single turnips with his friend.
More examples (1)
The seeds did not germinate in many parts of a row until rains in end of June and thunderplumps in first week of July brought them up later in patches, so that no second sowing was necessary, but singling was done by stages.
To take the irregular gait called singlefoot.
Usage- of a horse
- Examples
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More examples (1)
Many very fleet horses, when overdriven, adopt a disagreeable gait, which seems to be a cross between a pace and a trot, in which the two legs of one side are raised almost but not quite, simultaneously. Such horses are said to single, or to be single-footed.
To sequester; to withdraw; to retire.
Usage- Archaic
- Intransitive
- Examples
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an agent singling itself from consorts
To take alone, or one by one; to single out.
Usage- Archaic
- Intransitive
- Examples
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men […] commendable when they are singled
To reduce (a railway) to single track.
Usage- Transitive
- Examples
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More examples (1)
In the east of Yorkshire, Mr. A. M. Ross reports the belief of local railwaymen that the N.E.R. plans to single the York-Beverley line, leaving an adequate provision of passing loops, and to operate it by C.T.C. from York; […]
The Henley branch, recently singled and fully track-circuited, is worked by acceptance lever between Twyford and Shiplake cabins.
More examples (1)
Sadly, it's not the quickest route as much of it has been singled, but it still boasts some attractive stations as well as an active Community Rail Partnership, one of the first in the country.
Adjective
being or characteristic of a single thing or person
- Examples
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individual drops of rain
please mark the individual pages
More examples (1)
they went their individual ways
used of flowers having usually only one row or whorl of petals
- Antonyms
- Examples
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single chrysanthemums resemble daisies and may have more than one row of petals
existing alone or consisting of one entity or part or aspect or individual
- Antonyms
- Examples
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upon the hill stood a single tower
had but a single thought which was to escape
More examples (4)
a single survivor
a single serving
a single lens
a single thickness
not married or related to the unmarried state
- Synonyms
- Examples
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unmarried men and women
unmarried life
More examples (3)
sex and the single girl
single parenthood
are you married or single?
characteristic of or meant for a single person or thing
- Synonyms
- Examples
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an individual serving
single occupancy
More examples (1)
a single bed
having uniform application
- Examples
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a single legal code for all
not divided among or brought to bear on more than one object or objective
- Examples
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judging a contest with a single eye
a single devotion to duty
More examples (2)
undivided affection
gained their exclusive attention
Noun
a base hit on which the batter stops safely at first base
- Synonyms
the smallest whole number or a numeral representing this number
- Examples
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he has the one but will need a two and three to go with it
they had lunch at one
Verb
hit a single
- Broader terms
- Examples
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the batter singled to left field