Dictionary.com
Dictionary.com gives definitions from several different dictionaries on the results page. And audio pronunciations. They also have a thesaurus.
OneLook
OneLook gets results from hundreds of dictionaries, but requires an extra step to each definition. Best for serious research or unusual / topic specific words ( medical terms, foreign language etc.)
- HINT: Adding wild cards expands the search. (* = any number of characters and ? = exactly one character). For example, “tomo*ow“, “tomo??ow“ or “tomor*” will find “tomorrow”.
- Includes 41 sports, 16 religious, 54 medical, 57 computer & 61 financial dictionaries!
- Try their new “reverse dictionary” – enter a meaning and find the words
Others
- MW is an old, reliable American resource…
- Collins Dictionary – making dictionaries since 1819
- WordSmyth is aimed at school children, and has three levels of results to suit different age groups
Rhymes
Rhyme Zone - great for poets and rappers!
Rhymer – better for rappers, as the rhymes are plentiful and more of a stretch
Visual Thesaurus
Some people prefer these, so give one a go!
- VisualThesaurus.com – they charge a fee, but you can try it first
- VisuWords – free
More Resources
- VoyCabulary - makes the words on any webpage into links so you can look them up in a dictionary, by simply clicking on the words.
- What Is? – Definitions for thousands of the most current IT-related words
- WordSpy Top 100 – lots of newly coined words and phrases – see also Urban Dictionary
- Phrase Finder - type in a word and it returns a list of phrases that are related to your word in some way – not free!
- Quotations & Proverbs – search many engines at Fagan Finder
- Your Dictionary – more than 1800 dictionaries, in over 250 languages – the place to find specialty dictionaries
- Cambridge Dictionaires Online – search the famous dictionary
- Oxford FAQ – a database of some of the questions sent into the Oxford Word and Language Service team. You can ask them question yourself, if you want.
- Psuedo Dictionary – 14,000 made up words
- Devil’s Dictionary - by Ambrose Bierce, 1911
- Grandiloquent Dictionary – over a thousand of the most obscure and unusual English words
- Symbols
- more than 2,500 Western signs, arranged into 54 groups according to their graphic characteristics. - Acronym Finder
- over 3 million acronyms and abbreviations listed - Abbreviations
- 348,000 acronyms & abbreviations - Spell Check – just enter some text and get it spell and grammar-checked like Word does but online
- Oxford Dictionary CD-ROM – this place has the cheapest copies ($198 last time I looked)
ORIGIN OF WORDS
- Take Our Word For It – weekly word-origin webzine
- World Wide Words – the interesting history behind over a thousand of words and phrases
- Online Etymology Dictionary – probably the largest free online etymological database
PUZZLE TOOLS
- Jumble Solver / One Across
- both handy for solving word puzzles - Wordsmith - Anagrams – stick your name in and press the button!