swipe

/swaɪp/

/swaɪp/

Other forms: swiped; swipes; swiping

When you swipe something, you move it in a sweeping motion, like the way you swipe your credit card through a reader. Swipe can also mean "to steal," like when your little sisters swipe the cookies you baked before they cool.

You might swipe at the mosquitos buzzing around your head at a summer picnic, or swipe your finger across a touchscreen to sign for a purchase. When used to mean "steal," swipe is a gentle kind of verb: it's not quite "burglarize," but closer to "sneak off with." This newer meaning comes from American prison slang, first appearing in the 1880s.

Definitions of swipe

1. noun

   a sweeping stroke or blow
   type of:

   shot, stroke

   (sports) the act of swinging or striking at a ball with a club or racket or bat or cue or hand
2. verb

   strike with a swiping motion
   type of:

   hit

   deal a blow to, either with the hand or with an instrument
3. verb

   make off with belongings of others
   synonyms: abstract, cabbage, filch, hook, lift, nobble, pilfer, pinch, purloin, snarf, sneak

   type of:

   steal

   take without the owner's consent