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Glite Dictionary
🧶 A yarn machine ⏳ A loading icon
spinning wheel

spinning wheel

1 4.2
A small circle on the screen that spins to show the computer is busy
  • noun
  • /ˈspɪnɪŋ wiːl/
  • Specialized
translation icon : rueda de carga
  • The spinning wheel on my laptop showed that the application was processing my request.

Examples

  • When I opened the program, I saw the spinning wheel, indicating that it was loading my files.

  • Same when an app shows the spinning wheel of death while trying to fetch data from the servers.

    Blog text (23)

  • Every time I try to open a new tab, the spinning wheel appears, signaling that the system is busy.

Synonyms

spinner
vsspinning wheel
  • Texting
3.5

A moving icon that shows a page or app is loading

is circular and spins rather than moving in other ways
web spinner
vsspinning wheel
  • Texting
3.9

A small spinning image on a website that shows the page is loading

is used across computing interfaces rather than only on websites or apps

How Visible

hourglass
20 4.1
spinning wheel
  • Specialized
1 4.2
cursor
  • Specialized
16 3.0

Surface Forms

spinning wheel singular
spinning wheels plural

Morphology

spin + wheel

The meaning is directly compositional: 'spin' (rotate) + 'wheel' (round rotating object) yields the image of a rotating circular item, so a B1 learner who knows both words can infer a rotating indicator. The application to computing/UI is a straightforward metonymic extension of the literal object and is cross-linguistically comparable, so the expression remains immediately comprehensible.

Etymology

Spinning wheel on screens is named after the old machine because a small circle turns like a real wheel to show the computer is 'busy' or 'loading'. That's why we call the on-screen turning circle a 'spinning wheel'.