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Want
Definitions
- 1 A personification of want.
- 1 A desire, wish, longing. countable
"After a search which produced most of the things on our wants list, we went down to picnic on the shore in the sunshine-with a good stretch of shingle behind us over which no triffid could approach unheard."
- 2 A mole (Talpa europea). dialectal
"Lic. She hath the ears of a want. / Pec. Doth she want ears?"
- 3 a specific feeling of desire wordnet
- 4 Lack, absence, deficiency. countable
"She showed a want of caution in renting her house to complete strangers."
- 5 anything that is necessary but lacking wordnet
Show 5 more definitions
- 6 Poverty. uncountable
"Nothing is so hard for those who abound in riches, as to conceive how others can be in want."
- 7 the state of needing something that is absent or unavailable wordnet
- 8 Something needed or desired; a thing of which the loss is felt. countable, uncountable
"Habitual superfluities become actual wants."
- 9 a state of extreme poverty wordnet
- 10 A depression in coal strata, hollowed out before the subsequent deposition took place. UK, countable, uncountable
- 1 To wish for or desire (something); to feel a need or desire for; to crave, hanker, or demand. transitive
"I want you as a friend, not a foe."
- 2 wish or demand the presence of wordnet
- 3 To wish for or desire (something); to feel a need or desire for; to crave, hanker, or demand.; To make it easy or tempting to do something undesirable, or to make it hard or challenging to refrain from doing it. broadly, transitive
"The game developers of Candy Crush want you to waste large, copious amounts of your money on in-game purchases to buy boosters and lives."
- 4 have need of wordnet
- 5 To wish, desire, or demand to see, have the presence of or do business with. transitive
"Ma’am, you are exactly the professional we want for this job."
Show 12 more definitions
- 6 hunt or look for; want for a particular reason wordnet
- 7 To desire (to experience desire); to wish. intransitive
"You can leave if you want."
- 8 feel or have a desire for; want strongly wordnet
- 9 To be advised to do something (compare should, ought). colloquial, second-person, usually
"You’ll want to repeat this three or four times to get the best result."
- 10 be without, lack; be deficient in wordnet
- 11 To lack and be in need of or require (something, such as a noun or verbal noun). colloquial, transitive
"The lady, it is said, will inherit a fortune of three hundred pounds a year, with two cool thousands left by an uncle, on her arriving at the age of twenty-one, of which she wants but a few months."
- 12 To have occasion for (something requisite or useful); to require or need. archaic, transitive
"Man wants but little, nor that little long."
- 13 To be lacking or deficient or absent. dated, intransitive
"There was something wanting in the play."
- 14 To be in a state of destitution; to be needy; to lack. dated, intransitive
"You have a gift, sir (thank your education), / Will never let you want."
- 15 To lack and be without, to not have (something). archaic, transitive
"he that hath skill to be a pilot wants a ship; and he that could govern a commonwealth[…]wants means to exercise his worth, hath not a poor office to manage."
- 16 To lack and perhaps be able or willing to do without. broadly, obsolete, transitive
"[…] which the Kings of Assyria had left for the maintenance of this Temple sacrifices, after the ouerthrow thereof, was shared among the Chaldzans; which they by this attempt were like to lose, and therefore were willing to want his presence."
- 17 To desire a romantic or (especially) sexual relationship with someone; to lust for.
"Dang, girl! Your brother is gorgeous! I want him so bad!"
Etymology
From Middle English wanten (“to lack, to need”), from Old Norse vanta (“to lack”), from Proto-Germanic *wanatōną (“to be wanting, lack”), from *wanô (“lack, deficiency”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁weh₂- (“empty”). Cognate with Middle High German wan (“not full, empty”), Middle Dutch wan (“empty, poor”), Old English wana (“want, lack, absence, deficiency”), Latin vanus (“empty”). See wan, wan-.
From Middle English wanten (“to lack, to need”), from Old Norse vanta (“to lack”), from Proto-Germanic *wanatōną (“to be wanting, lack”), from *wanô (“lack, deficiency”), from Proto-Indo-European *h₁weh₂- (“empty”). Cognate with Middle High German wan (“not full, empty”), Middle Dutch wan (“empty, poor”), Old English wana (“want, lack, absence, deficiency”), Latin vanus (“empty”). See wan, wan-.
From Middle English wont (“mole”), from Old English wand, wond, from Proto-Germanic *wanduz.
See also for "want"
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