• enPR: wāv, IPA: /weɪv/

wave (waves, present participle waving; past and past participle waved)

1. (intransitive) To move back and forth repeatedly and somewhat loosely.

   The flag waved in the gentle breeze.

2. (intransitive) To move one’s hand back and forth (generally above the head) in greeting or departure.
3. (transitive, metonymic) To call attention to, or give a direction or command to, by a waving motion, as of the hand; to signify by waving; to beckon; to signal; to indicate.
   • c. 1599–1602, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke”, 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 I, scene iv]:

     Look, with what courteous action / It waves you to a more removed ground.

   • 1847, Alfred Tennyson, The Princess: A Medley, London: Edward Moxon, […], OCLC 2024748 ↗, part 2:

     She spoke, and bowing waved / Dismissal.

   I waved goodbye from across the room.
4. (intransitive) To have an undulating or wavy form.
5. (transitive) To raise into inequalities of surface; to give an undulating form or surface to.
   • c. 1603–1606, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of King Lear”, 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 IV, scene vi]:

     horns whelked and waved like the enridged sea

6. (transitive) To produce waves to the hair.
   • 1977, Agatha Christie, chapter 4, in An Autobiography, part II, London: Collins, →ISBN:

     There was also hairdressing: hairdressing, too, really was hairdressing in those times — no running a comb through it and that was that. It was curled, frizzed, waved, put in curlers overnight, waved with hot tongs; […].

7. (intransitive, baseball) To swing and miss at a pitch.

   Jones waves at strike one.

8. (transitive) To cause to move back and forth repeatedly.

   The starter waved the flag to begin the race.

9. (transitive, metonymic) To signal (someone or something) with a waving movement.
10. (intransitive, obsolete) To fluctuate; to waver; to be in an unsettled state.
    • c. 1608–1609, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedy of Coriolanus”, 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 II, scene ii]:

      He waved indifferently 'twixt doing them neither good nor harm.

11. (intransitive, ergative) To move like a wave, or by floating; to waft.

• wave the white flag

• French: (flag) flotter
• German: wedeln, schwenken, flattern, wogen
• Italian: ondeggiare
• Portuguese: ondular
• Russian: (e.g. a flag) развева́ться
• Spanish: ondular

• French: saluer
• German: winken
• Portuguese: acenar
• Russian: маха́ть
• Spanish: saludar con la mano abierta

• French: onduler
• German: wellen
• Portuguese: ondular

• German: ondulieren, wellen
• Portuguese: ondear
• Spanish: ondular

• Spanish: abanicar

• German: wedeln
• Portuguese: agitar, ondear
• Spanish: agitar, tremolar

• German: zuwinken
• Portuguese: acenar

wave (plural waves)

1. A moving disturbance in the level of a body of liquid; an undulation.

   The wave traveled from the center of the lake before breaking on the shore.

2. (poetic) The ocean.
   • 1895, Fiona Macleod (William Sharp (writer)), The Sin-Eater and Other Tales

     […] your father Murtagh Ross, and his lawful childless wife, Dionaid, and his sister Anna—one and all, they lie beneath the green wave or in the brown mould.

3. (physics) A moving disturbance in the energy level of a field.

   Gravity waves, while predicted by theory for decades, have been notoriously difficult to detect.

4. A shape that alternatingly curves in opposite directions.

   Her hair had a nice wave to it.

   sine wave

5. Any of a number of species of moths in the geometrid subfamily Sterrhinae, which have wavy markings on the wings.
6. A loose back-and-forth movement, as of the hands.

   He dismissed her with a wave of the hand.

7. (figuratively) A sudden unusually large amount of something that is temporarily experienced.

   Synonyms: rush

   A wave of shoppers stampeded through the door when the store opened for its Christmas discount special.

   A wave of retirees began moving to the coastal area.

   A wave of emotion overcame her when she thought about her son who was killed in battle.

8. (video games, by extension) One of the successive swarms of enemies sent to attack the player in certain games.
9. (usually "the wave") A group activity in a crowd imitating a wave going through water, where people in successive parts of the crowd stand and stretch upward, then sit.

• (an undulation) und (obsolete, rare)
• (group activity) Mexican wave (chiefly Commonwealth)

• French: vague, flot
• German: Welle, Woge
• Italian: onda
• Portuguese: onda, vaga
• Russian: волна́
• Spanish: onda, ola

• French: onde
• German: Welle, Wirbel
• Portuguese: onda, ondulação
• Russian: волна́
• Spanish: onda

• French: ondulation
• German: Welle
• Portuguese: onda, ondulação
• Spanish: onda

• French: vague
• German: Welle
• Italian: ondata
• Portuguese: onda, enxame, leva
• Spanish: oleada

• German: Wink
• Portuguese: aceno

• Portuguese: ola

wave (waves, present participle waving; past and past participle waved)

1. Obsolete spelling of waive#English|waive

wave (plural WAVES)

1. (US, historical) A members of the WAVES; a member of the US Naval Reserve (Women's Reserve).
   • a. 1969, John Kennedy Toole, A Confederacy of Dunces:

     [H]e read the faded sticker on the crystal of the door, “A slip of the lip can sink a ship.” Below a WAVE held her finger to lips that had turned tan.