needle

1. 1.

   annoy or provoke, as by constant criticism

   “He needled her with his sarcastic remarks”

   Synonymsgoad

   Broaderharass
2. 2.

   prick with a needle

   Broaderprickle

   sewing

Other forms of needle

plural

needles·

past tense

needled·

present participle

needling·

Forms marked · are formed by the regular rule rather than recorded in the source data. English keeps a few hundred irregulars and the rest follow the pattern, so the rule is right far more often than not — but it is a rule, and the mark says so.

Questions about needle

What does needle mean?

needle means "the leaf of a conifer". That is the primary sense; the word has 6 in total, listed in full on this page.

How many syllables are in needle?

needle has 2 syllables: nee-dle. The stress falls on "nee". In IPA it is /ˈnidəl/.

What is another word for needle?

Close synonyms include acerate leaf, phonograph needle, goad. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

Is needle a common word?

needle is banded "Common" — everyday vocabulary in speech and writing. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.