Aboard

//əˈbɔɹd// adv, prep

adv, prep ·Moderate ·College level

Definitions

Adverb
  1. 1
    On board; into or within a ship or boat; hence, into or within a railway car. not-comparable

    "We all climbed aboard."

  2. 2
    On or onto a horse, a camel, etc. not-comparable

    "to sling a saddle aboard"

  3. 3
    On base. not-comparable

    "He doubled with two men aboard, scoring them both."

  4. 4
    Into a team, group, or company. not-comparable

    "The office manager welcomed him aboard."

  5. 5
    Alongside. not-comparable

    "The ships came close aboard to pass messages."

Adverb
  1. 1
    on first or second or third base wordnet
  2. 2
    on a ship, train, plane or other vehicle wordnet
  3. 3
    part of a group wordnet
  4. 4
    side by side wordnet
Preposition
  1. 1
    On board of; onto or into a ship, boat, train, plane.

    "We all went aboard the ship."

  2. 2
    Onto a horse.
  3. 3
    Across; athwart; alongside. obsolete

    "Nor iron bands aboard The Pontic Sea by their huge navy cast."

Synonyms

All synonyms
on boardafloatall aboardaloftalongsidealongside

Example

More examples

"As the plane was approaching turbulence, the pilot asked the passengers aboard the plane to fasten their seat belts."

Etymology

From Middle English abord, from a- (“on”) + bord (“board, side of a ship”); equivalent to a- + board.

Related phrases

all aboardfall aboard ofhaul the tacks aboardto hug the shoreto keep the land alongside one's shipto place close alongside to fight iton baseon board

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.