• (British) IPA: /ʃəʊl/, /ʃɒʊl/

shoal

1. (now rare) Shallow.

   shoal water

   • 1819, Lord Byron, Don Juan, III.19:

     But that part of the coast being shoal and bare, / And rough with reefs which ran out many a mile, / His port lay on the other side o' the isle.

shoal (plural shoals)

1. A sandbank or sandbar creating a shallow.

   • The god himself with ready trident stands, / And opes the deep, and spreads the moving sands, / Then heaves them off the shoals.

2. A shallow in a body of water.

   • The depth of your pond should be six feet; and on the sides some shoals for the fish to lay their spawn.

   • 1613, William Shakespeare; [John Fletcher], “The Famous History of the Life of King Henry the Eight”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: Printed by Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358 ↗, [Act III, scene ii]:

     Wolsey, that once trod the ways of glory, / And sounded all the depths and shoals of honour.

• (sandbank) sandbar, sandbank

• French: banc de sable
• German: Sandbank
• Italian: secca, banco di sabbia
• Portuguese: banco de areia
• Russian: мелково́дье
• Spanish: bajío, bajo, banco de arena

shoal (shoals, present participle shoaling; past and past participle shoaled)

1. To arrive at a shallow (or less deep) area.
2. To cause a shallowing; to come to a more shallow part of.

   • A ship shoals her water by advancing into that which is less deep.

3. To become shallow.

   The colour of the water shows where it shoals.

shoal (plural shoals)

1. Any large number of persons or things.
   • 1625, Francis Bacon, Of Vicissitude of Things

     great shoals of people

2. (collective) A large number of fish (or other sea creatures) of the same species swimming together.

   • Beneath, a shoal of silver fishes glides.

• (fish) school

shoal (shoals, present participle shoaling; past and past participle shoaled)

1. To collect in a shoal; to throng.

   The fish shoaled about the place.