Grandma

//ˈɡɹænmɑː// name, noun, verb, slang

name, noun, verb, slang ·Moderate ·High school level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    Grandmother. informal
  2. 2
    the mother of your father or mother wordnet
Verb
  1. 1
    To address (someone) as “grandma”. informal, rare, transitive

    "This Laura had died within a year of her marriage, but Lottie had claimed relationship to the family just the same, grandma-ing Mrs. Richards and aunty-ing the sisters. John, however, was never called uncle, except in fun."

  2. 2
    To be or act as a grandmother to (someone). ambitransitive, informal, rare

    "And what about Cliff working on cars and painting signs, and Wendy working nights to take care of that baby, and young Allen raking leaves for everyone, and Doris grandmaing folks, and wounded folks bouncing back to life . . . ?”"

Proper Noun
  1. 1
    An unfriendly and disparaging way of addressing an elderly woman whose name is unknown. derogatory, slang

Synonyms

All synonyms
grangrangrandmamagrandmothergrandmothergrannie

Example

More examples

"If Grandma doesn't come, the children will be disappointed."

Etymology

From grand- + ma, after grandmother.

Related phrases

coastal grandmadon't try to teach grandma how to suck eggseveryone and their grandmaglam-magrandma chicgreat-grandmagreat-great-grandmateach grandma how to suck eggs

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