Deb

//dɛb// name, noun, slang

name, noun, slang ·Moderate ·High school level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    A debutante (a young woman who makes her first formal appearance in society). informal

    "Josie Powell that was, prettiest deb in Dublin. How time flies by!"

  2. 2
    Initialism of dynamic energy budget. abbreviation, alt-of, countable, initialism, uncountable
  3. 3
    a young woman making her debut into society wordnet
  4. 4
    A debutante ball or debut. informal

    ""When I met him at my deb, I fell for him. Wanted nothing more than to marry him. That it happened, even after all those years, felt as if the stars had finally aligned.""

  5. 5
    Initialism of dystrophic epidermolysis bullosa. abbreviation, alt-of, countable, initialism, uncountable
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  1. 6
    A female member of a gang. dated, slang

    "Then one night Liz showed up at the factory with a scratched face and torn blouse. She had been in a fight at the park with another girl, a deb of the Porto Rican Flyers."

Proper Noun
  1. 1
    A diminutive of the female given name Deborah.
  2. 2
    A transliteration of the Bengali surname দেব (deb).

    "Radhakanta Deb, b. 1784"

  3. 3
    A surname from Bengali.

    "Sopan Deb, b. 1988"

Synonyms

All synonyms
debutanteapprenticearbiter of fashionbabybeau brummelbeginner

Example

More examples

"The Senate on Monday confirmed New Mexico Congresswoman Deb Haaland as interior secretary, making her the first Native American to lead a Cabinet department."

Etymology

Etymology 1

Clipping of debutante or debut.

Etymology 2

Shortening.

Etymology 3

Borrowed from Bengali দেব (deb).

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