pad out en · VERB
Pronunciation
- (Australia) audio
Meanings
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(idiomatic) To add something extra to something to make it appear more substantial.
With regard to definition-writing students, as a result of having spent years padding out written assignments in order to meet word-length requirements, were somewhat bemused to be told that fewer words were better than a long, wordy definition.
2015, James Lambert, “Lexicography as a teaching tool: A Hong Kong case study”, in Lan Li, Jamie McKeown, Liming Liu, editors, Dictionaries and corpora: Innovations in reference science. Proceedings of ASIALEX 2015 Hong Kong, Hong Kong: The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, page 146:Some students pad out their essays by adding a whole lot of quotes from random sources.
Have you heard about girls padding out their bras to make their breasts look bigger?
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(idiomatic, slang) To sleep or go to bed.
Because of my job I usually pad out just before nine o'clock.
My housemate was very annoyed to find my friends padded out on the lounge room floor this morning.
Forms
| Spelling | Features | Labels | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| padded out | Tense=Past, VerbForm=Part | lexicographic | |
| padded out | Tense=Past | lexicographic | |
| pads out | Number=Sing, Person=3, Tense=Pres | lexicographic | |
| padding out | Tense=Pres, VerbForm=Part | lexicographic |
Translations (16)
cmn 拉長 /拉长 (add something) · pl pójść w kimono (sleep) · fi topata (add something) · pl wydłużyć (add something) · pl iść w kimono (sleep) · cmn 睡覺 /睡觉 (sleep) · pl wydłużać (add something) · cmn 瞌睡 (sleep) · fi nukahtaa (sleep) · pl rozwlec (add something) · fi paikata (add something) · pt encher chouriços (add something) · pl rozwlekać (add something) · pt encher linguiça (add something) · pt pegar no sono (sleep) · cmn 填滿 /填满 (add something)