stub

/stəb/

/stəb/

Other forms: stubs; stubbed; stubbing

The small remainder of something is a stub. If you sharpen your favorite pencil obsessively, soon you'll be left with just a stub.

Anything that's leftover or unusually short can be a stub, from the ticket stub you're handed in the theater to your dog's little stub of a tail. As a verb, stub most often means "strike painfully against something," and it's toes that you most often stub: "Put your shoes on before you run around in the yard, or you'll stub your toe again!"

Definitions of stub

1. noun

   the small unused part of something (especially the end of a cigarette that is left after smoking)
   synonyms: butt

   types:

   cigar butt

   small part of a cigar that is left after smoking

   cigarette butt

   small part of a cigarette that is left after smoking

   roach

   the butt of a marijuana cigarette

   type of:

   part, portion

   something less than the whole of a human artifact
2. noun

   a small piece
   “a stub of a pencil”

   synonyms: nub

   types:

   nubbin

   a small nub (especially an undeveloped fruit or ear of corn)

   type of:

   part, piece

   a portion of a natural object
3. noun

   a short piece remaining on a trunk or stem where a branch is lost
   type of:

   plant part, plant structure

   any part of a plant or fungus
4. noun

   the part of a check that is retained as a record
   synonyms: check stub, counterfoil

   type of:

   record

   anything (such as a document or a phonograph record or a photograph) providing permanent evidence of or information about past events
5. noun

   a torn part of a ticket returned to the holder as a receipt
   synonyms: ticket stub

   types:

   rain check

   a ticket stub entitling the holder to admission to a future event if the scheduled event was cancelled due to rain

   type of:

   receipt

   an acknowledgment (usually tangible) that payment has been made
6. verb

   pull up (weeds) by their roots
   type of:

   deracinate, extirpate, root out, uproot

   pull up by or as if by the roots
7. verb

   clear of weeds by uprooting them
   “stub a field”

   type of:

   weed

   clear of weeds
8. verb

   strike (one's toe) accidentally against an object
   “She stubbed her toe in the dark and now it's broken”

   type of:

   collide with, hit, impinge on, run into, strike

   hit against; come into sudden contact with
9. verb

   extinguish by crushing
   type of:

   blow out, extinguish, quench, snuff out

   put out, as of fires, flames, or lights