Definition of "waffle" in English

noun

1. (countable) A flat pastry pressed with a grid pattern, often eaten hot with butter and/or honey or syrup.

   • The brunch was waffles with strawberries and whipped cream.

2. (countable, British) In full potato waffle: a savoury flat potato cake with the same kind of grid pattern.

3. (construction, also attributively) A concrete slab used in flooring with a gridlike structure of ribs running at right angles to each other on its underside.

4. (textiles, chiefly attributively) A type of fabric woven with a honeycomb texture.

verb

1. (transitive, slang) To smash (something).

   • These were not the Cowboys who were waffled, 45–14, here at mid-season. They came prepared to play a championship football game, with an ultra-conservative game plan suited to the horrendous turf conditions, and came close to pulling it off …

verb

1. (intransitive) To speak or write evasively or vaguely.

2. (intransitive) Of a bird: to move in a side-to-side motion while descending before landing.

   • The geese waffled as they approached the water.

3. (intransitive, aviation, road transport, colloquial) Of an aircraft or motor vehicle: to travel in a slow and unhurried manner.

4. (intransitive, originally Northern England, Scotland, colloquial) To be indecisive about something; to dither, to vacillate, to waver.

5. (ambitransitive) Often followed by on: to speak or write (something) at length without any clear aim or point; to ramble.

6. (transitive) To hold horizontally and rotate (one's hand) back and forth in a gesture of ambivalence or vacillation.

noun

1. (colloquial) (Often lengthy) speech or writing that is evasive or vague, or pretentious.

   • This interesting point seems to get lost a little within a lot of self-important waffle.

verb

1. (intransitive, British, dialectal) Of a dog: to bark with a high pitch like a puppy, or in muffled manner.

noun

1. (British, dialectal) The high-pitched sound made by a young dog; also, a muffled bark.