What does "shunt" mean?
An act of moving (suddenly), as due to a push or shove.
Shunt
/ʃʌnt/ noun, verb, slang
noun, verb, slang ·Common ·High school level
Meaning at a glance
- Primary sense: An act of moving (suddenly), as due to a push or shove.
- Grammar: shunt is listed as noun, verb, slang.
- Nearest alternatives: bypass, advance, avert, bear off.
- Useful contrasts: advance, block current, blockage.
- Usage evidence: Can we shunt the water over to the canal?
How to use "shunt"
- Start with the primary definition, then check the part of speech before placing the word in a sentence.
- Compare nearby synonyms to make sure "shunt" carries the exact meaning, tone, and strength you need.
- Use the example sentence as a context check. If your sentence uses the word differently, confirm that the grammar still fits.
Meaning check
- Does the word fit the sentence's grammar?
- Does it match the intended tone rather than only the dictionary definition?
- Would a simpler synonym be clearer for the reader?
- Is there enough surrounding context to prevent ambiguity?
Source and review context
This entry combines structured lexical data with WordToolSet review checks. Definitions, examples, synonyms, and usage notes may come from different source tables, so the page is designed to show evidence from more than one angle before you rely on "shunt" in a final draft.
If a word has several senses, prefer the sense that matches your sentence's grammar and surrounding context. A correct definition can still be the wrong choice when the sentence needs a different register, emphasis, or level of specificity.
Before you rely on this definition
Read the first definition as a starting point, then check the example, synonyms, and part of speech before treating "shunt" as the right word for your sentence.
If your draft is formal, technical, persuasive, or sensitive, compare "shunt" with a nearby alternative so the final choice matches both meaning and reader expectation.
Compare nearby meanings
- Use synonyms when you need a softer, stronger, simpler, or more specific word.
- Use antonyms to check the boundary of the meaning and avoid accidental contrast.
- Use the example sentence to confirm the word behaves naturally in context.
- Keep the original wording when a replacement adds complexity without improving precision.
Definition decision workflow
1. Identify the role
Check whether "shunt" is acting as noun, verb, slang in your sentence. A definition is only useful when the grammar matches the way the word is being used.
2. Test the nearest option
Compare it with "bypass" and other nearby choices to see whether the sentence needs a softer, stronger, or more familiar word.
3. Confirm with context
Use the example sentence below as an evidence check, then read your own sentence out loud to catch tone or rhythm problems.
Review note: Definition pages are checked for source coverage, sentence evidence, synonym support, and editorial insight before they are treated as approval-ready pages. If the evidence is too thin, the page remains available to users but is kept out of the approval-facing indexed inventory.
Final meaning check
Before publishing a sentence with "shunt", ask whether the word helps the reader understand the idea faster. A precise word should reduce confusion, not simply make the sentence look more polished.
When the definition, synonym evidence, and example context point in the same direction, the word is usually a safer choice. When they conflict, revise the sentence or choose a clearer alternative.
Definitions
Noun
- 1 An act of moving (suddenly), as due to a push or shove.
"Blindside loosie Jerome Kaino got [Conor] Murray after he'd kicked in the 10th minute, then the halfback hurt a wrist after Brodie Retallick gave him a shunt."
- 2 implant consisting of a tube made of plastic or rubber; for draining fluids within the body wordnet
- 3 A connection used as an alternative path between parts of an electrical circuit.
"The sensibility of a galvanometer may be varied in a very simple manner by the use of what is termed a shunt. A shunt is a resistance coil, or coil of fine wire used to divert some definite portion of a current, taking it past a galvanometer instead of through its coils."
- 4 a conductor having low resistance in parallel with another device to divert a fraction of the current wordnet
- 5 The shifting of the studs on a projectile from the deep to the shallow sides of the grooves in its discharge from a shunt gun.
"In length, this gun was the same as the French, but weighed 9 cwt. less. It was rifled in six grooves on the shunt plan, in the form in which it has been generally applied to large guns, with the difference that some of the angles of the grooving were rounded off. […] To impede fouling, a slightly greater windage was allowed in the chamber of the shunt gun, the diameter there being 0.04 greater than at the mouth of the bore."
Show 5 more definitions
- 6 a passage by which a bodily fluid (especially blood) is diverted from one channel to another wordnet
- 7 An abnormal passage between body channels.
"Portosystemic shunts can be congenital or acquired with congenital PSS commonly comprising a single communicating vessel between the portal venous circulation and the systemic circulation via the caudal vena cava or azygos vein. Of congenital shunts, 66–75% are extrahepatic. Intrahepatic portosystemic shunts are most commonly identified in larger breeds of dog (though we have also seen a number of terriers with intrahepatic shunts through our clinic)."
- 8 A passage between body channels constructed surgically as a bypass; a tube inserted into the body to create such a passage.
"We present an extremely rare case of delayed and combined ventriculoperitoneal shunt blockage, viscus perforation and migration into the urethra manifested by a repeated urinary tract infection. This was discovered six months after the shunt was inserted."
- 9 A switch on a railway used to move a train from one track to another.
"These improvements consist, firstly, in a novel construction of apparatus to be attached to or applied upon railways, at those parts termed switches, shunts, or moveable rails, which are commonly used for transferring engines, carriages, or trains, from one line of rails to another, as occasion may require, and which apparatus I call a "switch or shunt protector.""
- 10 A minor collision between vehicles. British, informal
"At the first race in Brazil, I became involved in a four-car shunt. I won't go into too much detail now, except to say that the accident had nothing to do with me. […] Everyone else was avoiding the accident when [Jos] Verstappen lost control on the grass, came right into me – and off we all went. It was a huge shunt."
Verb
- 1 To cause to move (suddenly), as by pushing or shoving; to give a (sudden) start to. transitive
"For we are all shunting—shunting—shunting / We're all shunting in this queer world of ours. / Nations are shunted like to our railway carriages: / As Napoleon shunted la belle France into war; / Princes are shunted into royal marriages; / Kings and Queens are shunted just like a railway car."
- 2 transfer to another track, of trains wordnet
- 3 To divert to a less important place, position, or state. transitive
"Here in England it is, thank God! the custom for us to shunt ourselves off the grand trunk railroad of business, in tearing up and down which our lives are mainly passed, into some quiet siding once every year. […] [W]hen July is running into August, and everything is breaking up, you feel that your business for the season—be it in commerce, law, or literature—is achieved, and that the time for your being temporarily shunted has arrived."
- 4 provide with or divert by means of an electrical shunt wordnet
- 5 To provide with a shunt. transitive
"to shunt a galvanometer"
Show 7 more definitions
- 6 To move data in memory to a physical disk. transitive
"A momentary power spike had caused a blip, forcing the backup system to shunt Carella's current work into a safety file. It was standard operating procedure, a decision made by the online computer itself."
- 7 To divert electric current by providing an alternative path. transitive
"The method of running an electric motor herein set out, which consists in starting the motor with the two halves of its armature in series with a resistance in a two-pole field, then gradually cutting out the resistance, then including the resistance and shunting one-half the motor, then opening the circuit of the shunted half and throwing the two halves of the motor in multiple in a four-pole field, and finally, cutting out the resistance."
- 8 To move a train from one track to another, or to move carriages, etc. from one train to another. transitive
"Porter, run over while shunting a luggage train, in consequence of his getting entangled in shunting-rope."
- 9 To have a minor collision, especially in a motor car. British, informal, transitive
"The main argument for the use of culpability as a categorizer is that some accidents can be said to be independent of the behaviour of at least one of the drivers, for example, being shunted when having stopped for a red light (in a slow and controlled manner, at least)."
- 10 To divert the flow of a body fluid. transitive
"There are times when one has no alternative other than to attempt to shunt the cerebrospinal fluid into the pleural cavity, a potential space, which may occasionally be capable of absorbing the fluid."
- 11 To turn aside or away; to divert. British, dialectal, obsolete, transitive
- 12 To carry on arbitrage between the London stock exchange and provincial stock exchanges. UK, historical
Example
"Can we shunt the water over to the canal?"
Common questions
What is a synonym for "shunt"?
Common synonyms include: bypass, advance, avert, bear off, bowl, bunt.
How do you use "shunt" in a sentence?
Can we shunt the water over to the canal?
How do you pronounce "shunt"?
Pronounced /ʃʌnt/.
Etymology
From Middle English schonten, schunten (“to jerk, swerve; to dodge, escape”), either: * possibly a back-formation from Middle English schonen (“to avoid, refuse, hate, fear”), from Old English sċunian, sċyniġan; see shun. Or * an alteration of Middle English *schunden, *schynden, from Old English sċyndan, sċendan (“to hasten, hurry”) (as in āsċyndan (“to remove, take away”), from Proto-West Germanic *skundijan, from Proto-Germanic *skundijaną (“to impel, hasten”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)kewt- (“to rattle, shake”). * from unrecorded Old English *sċunettan, a derivative of sċunian (“to shun, avoid”). As regards the noun sense, compare Middle English shunt (“swerve; sudden jerk”), derived from the verb.