Loads

How to spell loads

5 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce loads

What does loads mean?

1. nounMore than one quantity of goods or material carried or moved at once.
2. nounInformal term for a large amount or great many of something.
3. verbPuts a quantity of goods, data, or material onto or into something; used with he, she, or it.

Loads in a sentence

• noun

  The removal van made three separate loads between the two houses.

• noun

  There were loads of people queuing outside the new bakery.

• verb

  He loads the dishwasher every evening after dinner.

• noun

  The washing machine can handle two full loads before lunch.

• noun

  She still has loads of work to finish before the deadline.

• verb

  The warehouse robot loads each pallet onto the lorry automatically.

Where does loads come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This is the plural and third-person form of 'load', which descends from the Old English noun 'lad', meaning a way, a course, or a journey, and by extension the act of carrying. That original sense of travel survives in the related word 'lode' (a vein of ore) and in 'lodestar', the guiding star, as well as in 'lead' as in to lead a route. During the Middle English period the meaning drifted from the journey itself toward the thing carried on it, giving us the modern idea of a burden or a quantity of goods. By the 1600s the word had also taken on the informal sense of a large amount, which is why 'loads' came to mean simply 'a great many'. The spelling stays regular: keep the silent reminder that the vowel is the long 'oa' of 'road' and 'toad', and the plural is just an added -s.

How the word is built

• load (a burden or quantity carried)
• -s (plural noun / third-person verb ending)