Broad

How to spell broad

5 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce broad

What does broad mean?

1. adjectiveHaving a large distance from side to side; wide or extensive in range.
2. adjectiveUsed to describe full, open daylight, as in something done openly and without concealment.

Broad in a sentence

• The river was too broad to cross without a bridge.

• The thieves struck in broad daylight while the shop was busy.

• The new policy has broad support across the company.

• The burglary happened in broad daylight, which shocked the neighbours.

Where does broad come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This word descends directly from the Old English brad, meaning 'wide' or 'spacious', and it has been part of English since the earliest written records. It traces back to a common Germanic ancestor that also gave Dutch 'breed' and German 'breit', all carrying the basic idea of stretching out in width. For most of its history the spelling was simpler, but the modern 'oa' settled in to represent the long vowel sound, which is exactly the trap: the word sounds like 'brawd' yet is written with 'oa'. The related noun 'breadth' preserves an older vowel quality from the same family, and the verb 'broaden' was built on top of the adjective much later. From the literal sense of physical width, English developed many figurative uses, such as a broad outline or broad agreement, where it means general or wide-ranging rather than narrowly detailed.

How the word is built

• broad (from Old English brad: wide, ample), a single Germanic root with no affixes