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Glite Dictionary
🤏 To touch lightly 🤏 A light touch 🧈 A small amount 🕺 A dance move 🕺 To dance 💨 To inhale concentrate
dab

dab

8 2.0
A light quick touch with your hand or a cloth
  • noun
  • /dæb/
translation icon : toque
  • Use a sponge with a dab of white face paint to blend for a realistic skull look.
  • dab on the eye

Like it's OK, but how about just a dab of elf primer and fuse blush in?

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Examples

  • Val gingerly dabs iodine onto the cuts on Rhonda's legs.

    Fiction book (1990)

  • The artist used a dab of paint to highlight the clouds in her landscape.

  • We all know a little dab of this, a little dab of that.

  • Take a little dab, sorry, little dab on the end of my nose.

  • Now I'm going to start with a dab in the centre.

  • And I'm going to apply a little dab and then blend it in.

  • So just a few dabs at the outer corner.

  • Corrections are made with a dab of fluid that seals the error.

    Fiction book (1996)

  • I'm going to take just a dab of the darker blush from the palette.

  • "Yes, wasn't it?" agreed Annabelle, studiously applying a dab of Denmark lotion across her cheekbones.

    Fiction book (1990)

Synonyms

pat
vsdab
∞ 1.0

A quick gentle touch with the hand to show comfort or approval

is similar but more neutral and often done with a cloth or object
tap
vsdab
66 1.0

A light touch or sound from a gentle hit

is gentler and usually a brief soft contact rather than a small hit
light touch
vsdab
4 3.9

A gentle, brief contact made with little force

is specifically a quick gentle contact often with hand or cloth

Compounds

sand dab
  • US
1 8.4

A small flat fish like a flounder from the west coast of North America eaten as food

corn dab
  • US
8.6

A small oval cake made with cornmeal that is fried or baked

How Light

dab
8 2.0
pat
∞ 1.0
stroke
12 2.5
press
11 1.3

Surface Forms

dab singular
dabs plural

Etymology

Dab. A dab meaning a light touch probably comes from an old imitative word for a quick, gentle hit or 'tap', which is why we talk about dabbing with a brush or cloth.