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Glite Dictionary
🚬 Blowing out smoke 😮‍💨 Exhaling hard
puffing

puffing

1 2.7
Breathing out air quickly through the mouth or nose
  • noun
  • /ˈpʌfɪŋ/
translation icon : jadeo
  • My mother would drag the tub out into the kitchen with a lot of groaning and puffing.
  • huffing and puffing

Examples

  • So coming back to mouth puffing and the, the mouth closed is really important with obstructive sleep apnea.

  • The one time in the next several months that he came home early, he opened the door to sniff the by-now familiar odor of her spicy presence and found her huffing and puffing as she struggled to pull the sofa away from the window so that she might clean behind it.

    Fiction book (1995)

  • So coming back to mouth puffing and the, the mouth closed is really important with obstructive sleep apnea.

  • Gillespie, puffing, a weekend runner, strains to keep up with the dogs.

    Fiction book (1995)

  • Sunnat, sweating from the weight and puffing, started making some inhuman-sounding noises.

    Fiction book (1996)

  • When I hear the name calling, some huffing and puffing comes to mind, as if someone begins to sense their argument is falling apart and is in need of some Viagra-like stimulation.

    Blog text (33)

  • (Tennyson traveled frequently by train, but he never mentioned it in a poem: perhaps the thought of the puffing locomotive that took him to see the Queen might have disturbed the landscape of the Idylls of the King.)

    Academic text (2011)

  • (TRAIN ENGINE PUFFING)

    Anna Karenina (2012)

  • Besides the ring, the Leningrad Borough Komsomol gymnasium also gave room to wrestling mats and weights, so the walls resounded with the puffing of wrestlers and lifters.

    Fiction book (1992)

  • As he reached the top of the hill, his puffing breath filled the air, signaling his exhaustion.

Synonyms

blow
vspuffing
10 1.0

A strong breath out through the nose or mouth to clear it

is the exact same forceful outward breath in this sense
snorting
vspuffing
9 4.2

A hard breath out through the nose that makes a loud sound

is the forceful exhale that can use the mouth or be quieter
exhalation
vspuffing
6 4.3

Breathing out air from the lungs or the air that you breathe out

is the act of forcefully expelling air rather than normal breathing
huffing
vspuffing
5 6.1

A forceful breath out that shows you are tired, working hard, or annoyed

is the forceful exhale without necessarily showing emotion or effort
breathing out
vspuffing
1 1.0

To push air out of your lungs

is a vigorous outward breath not just regular respiratory movement

Antonyms

inhalation
  • Specialized
24 4.1

Breathing air or gas into the lungs

How Forceful

blowing
  • Specialized
38 7.3
puffing
1 2.7
exhalation
6 4.3

Surface Forms

puffing singular
puffings plural

Morphology

puffing = puff (transparent) = puff + ing

Derived from the verb 'puff' with the gerund/participle suffix '-ing'; the meaning 'act of exhaling air forcefully' is directly predictable from the base.

Etymology

Puffing comes from the short sound-word puff, which copies a quick blast of air. When you are out of breath you take quick 'puffing' breaths or make a short 'puff' to 'breathe out', so puffing means breathing out hard or panting.