Definitions
American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
- v. To stand idly about; linger aimlessly.
- v. To proceed slowly or with many stops: loitered all the way home.
- v. To delay or dawdle: loiter over a task.
Century Dictionary and Cyclopedia
- To linger; be unduly slow in moving; delay; be dilatory; spend time idly.
- Synonyms To lag, tarry, saunter, dilly-dally.
- To consume or waste, as time, idly or carelessly: used with away: as, he loitered away most of his leisure.
Wiktionary
- v. To stand about without any aim or purpose; to stand about idly; to linger; to hang around.
GNU Webster's 1913
- v. To be slow in moving; to delay; to linger; to be dilatory; to spend time idly; to saunter; to lag behind.
- v. obsolete To wander as an idle vagrant.
WordNet 3.0
- v. be about
Etymologies
- From Middle English loitren, from Middle Dutch loteren ("to shake, wag, wobble"), ultimately connected with a frequentative form of Proto-Germanic *lūtanan (“to bend, stoop, cower, shrink from, decline”), see lout. Cognate with Modern Dutch leuteren ("to dawdle"), Swiss German lottern ("to wobble"), German Lotterbube ("rascal"). More at lout, little. (Wiktionary)
- Middle English loitren, probably from Middle Dutch loteren, to totter, be loose. (American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition)
Examples
“If the Chamber or other lobbying groups send any staff to international summits like the upcoming Copenhagen conference, their goal is to "loiter" in the coffee shops and collect business cards from delegates they can target later on legislative matters back home.”
James Hoggan: The US Chamber of Commerce Is Killing the Copenhagen Climate Treaty
“Except to the coffee shops in Copenhagen to "loiter," of course.”
James Hoggan: The US Chamber of Commerce Is Killing the Copenhagen Climate Treaty
“An even more advanced Tactical Tomahawk coming in two years will be able to change course in midflight and even "loiter" over targets, doing lazy figure-eights in the sky, while it waits for exact coordinates.”
“He never mislaid the books, forgot, fumbled, or made a "loiter," _morantia_, as they called it, when the office halted or was unpunctual.”
Hugh, Bishop of Lincoln A Short Story of One of the Makers of Mediaeval England
“He might be compared to a wild beast, who dareth not to meddle with the traveller who goeth straightway on his errand, but lieth in wait for such as loiter and fall asleep by the wayside.”
“I have to go to each robot to hand enter ID for cigarettes and alcohol, so I don't have a lot of time to "loiter" at the cashier station anyway.”
“The drones can stay aloft for hours and hours, allowing them to "loiter" in the skies until they’re needed, he said "So with a few of them, you could get round-the-clock coverage.”
“For the most part, Jeremy did nothing but loiter on his front lawn, shirtless, and flaunt his tattoos.”
“Would an electric company not allowing non-employees to loiter around on its property be by the same principle an issue of private property?”
Coyote Blog » Blog Archive » When Conservatives Turn Against Private Property and Private Contracts
Lists
These user-created lists contain the word ‘loiter’.
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GRE Barrons Wordlist
A complete Barron's Wordlist for GRE preparation. Your online flashcard replacement.
abase, abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abject, abjure and 4087 more...
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movement (slow)
words describing slow action or movement
( open list, randomness, descriptive )
related:
http://www.wordnik.co...creep, crawl, plod, slouch, idle, lumber, tiptoe, bend, amble, mosey, saunter, loiter and 117 more...
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Stick Around
annotine, lasting, durable, everlasting, permanence, stable, abiding, immortal, hibernaculum, continual, dwelling-place, abiding-place and 57 more...
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wile away
words for passing time
shilly-shally, procrastinate, dawdle, dilly-dally, wile, idle, loaf, loiter, idyll, putz, surf, trifle and 1 more...
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Kalli's Words
redundant, munchkin, escapade, natch, boom, fap, geek, nocturnal, pedantic, tactile, conversant, oxymoron and 188 more...
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Twitter faves
The new favourite words of people on Twitter.
A script searches Twitter for "X is my new favourite word" and adds it to this list.
See also:
niglets, aw, flakey, shiznit, thatch, sexy, bummers, hotty, eargasms, ratchetry, weird, fab and 457 more... -
The Sog Collection
My big word list.
chaos, flaccid, empirical, flotsam, cacophony, grumble, assuage, awe, romance, mortality, coalesce, fortuitous and 3282 more...
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colleen's words
yellow, green, pie, blue, fur, people, incense, book, brown, avuncular, mountain, fog and 1316 more...
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kingofbash's Words
bash, poleaxed, salacious, libertine, charlatan, aplomb, fortuitous, finagle, apoplectic, debutante, carte blanche, aardvark and 472 more...
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NTDW1
template, modal, sublingual, tandem, polycentric, septuagenarian, token, irrevocable, denotive, augural, aberrant, phlebotomy and 1188 more...
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whitmanian
from the poetry and prose of walt whitman
celebrate, assume, loafe, grass, summer, distillation, atmosphere, undisguised, naked, mad, breath, loveroot and 291 more...
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stpeter's Words
abase, abasement, abashed, abdicate, aberrant, abeyance, abhor, abhorrent, abide, abject, ablation, abnegation and 3536 more...
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dienekes's Words
chutzpah, lexicon, intrepid, pedagogical, schlemiel, schism, erudite, anathema, pugilist, jaunty, paradigm, automaton and 949 more...
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5-0
Hecko, words! I’m so happy I’ve found you. I want to keep you all and never want to lose you again. I hope you like it here.
amscray, thistledown, tine, tinsel, pungent, snarl, wail, lanky, viscid, dawdle, luminous, stow and 2719 more...
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good words
words that are mostly fun to say or just lovely
undulate, voluptuous, whimsy, parse, dank, cerulean, peen, traipsing, listless, coup de grace, reconnoiter, mercurial and 499 more...
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ash
ash
abash, abate, abbreviate, abdicate, aberrant, aberration, abet, abeyance, abhor, abide, abject, abjure and 4874 more...
Tweets
Looking for tweets for loiter.

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