billowy
/ˈbɪ.ləʊ.(w)i/adjective
billowy is an adjective meaning “Swelling or swollen into large waves; full of billows or surges; resembling billows” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled B-I-L-L-O-W-Y and has 3 syllables, and it appears about once in every 12 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data).
What does billowy mean?
adjective
- 1
Swelling or swollen into large waves; full of billows or surges; resembling billows.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How do you pronounce billowy?
- UK /ˈbɪ.ləʊ.(w)i/
Billowy has 3 syllables (counted from the pronunciation).
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: LL-Q1860_(eng)-Vealhurl-billowy.wav, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).
Forms of billowy
- billowier comparative
- billowiest superlative
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).
How common is billowy?
Billowy appears about once in every 12 million words in written English, the 105,204th most frequent word form in the list.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Billowy in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese
In the sense full of billows or surges:
| Language | Words |
|---|---|
| German | wellig, wogend |
| Spanish | onduloso |
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Translations are Wiktionary's, by sense; a linked word has its own PlainSpell page.
Where does billowy come from?
From billow + -y.
Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).