Slow

How to spell slow

4 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce slow

What does slow mean?

1. adjectiveMoving, acting, or happening at a low speed or with little haste.
2. verbTo reduce speed or to make something happen at a lesser pace.

Slow in a sentence

• adjective

  The traffic was very slow on the motorway this morning.

• verb

  The wet road forced drivers to slow near the bend.

• adjective

  A slow internet connection made the video buffer constantly.

• verb

  Rising costs began to slow the company's expansion plans.

Where does slow come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

Slow comes from the Old English adjective slaw, which meant sluggish, dull, or lacking in quickness, and not only of movement but also of wit. It has solid Germanic roots, with close cousins in Old Norse slor and Dutch sleeuw, all pointing back to a shared sense of being heavy or inactive. For centuries the word carried a strong flavour of mental dullness, which is why old phrases describe someone as slow of understanding. Over time the everyday meaning narrowed toward a lack of physical speed, the sense we reach for first today. The spelling trap is mostly the silent partner: slow sounds exactly like sloe, the dark plum-like berry used to flavour gin, so the two are easily swapped in careless writing.

How the word is built

• slow (single Old English root meaning sluggish or dull; no prefix or suffix)