tan

1. 1.

   treat skins and hides with tannic acid so as to convert them into leather

   Broaderconvert

   Narrowerbark
2. 2.

   get a tan, from wind or sun

   Synonymsbronze

   Broaderdiscolor

   Narrowersuntan

1. 1.

   of a light yellowish-brown color

   Similarchromatic

Other forms of tan

plural

tans·

past tense or participle

tanned

present participle

tanning

comparative or superlative

tanner

comparative or superlative

tannest

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 tan

What does tan mean?

tan means "a browning of the skin resulting from exposure to the rays of the sun". That is the primary sense; the word has 6 in total, listed in full on this page.

How many syllables are in tan?

tan has 1 syllable: tan. In IPA it is /ˈtæn/.

What is another word for tan?

Close synonyms include suntan, sunburn, burn, topaz, tangent. 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 tan a common word?

tan 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.

What rhymes with tan?

6 words rhyme with tan. Rhymes are matched on the phonemes from the last stressed vowel onward, which is the definition a reader has in their head.