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gonad

/ˈɡoʊ.næd/noun

gonad is a noun meaning “A sex organ that produces gametes; specifically, a testicle or ovary” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). It is spelled G-O-N-A-D and has 2 syllables, and it appears about once in every 13 million words in written English (wordfreq, 2021 data). The plural of gonad is gonads.

What does gonad mean?

noun

  1. 1

    A sex organ that produces gametes; specifically, a testicle or ovary.

  2. 2

    slangA testicle.

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How do you pronounce gonad?

  • UK /ˈɡəʊ.næd/
  • US /ˈɡoʊ.næd/

Gonad has 2 syllables (counted from its American pronunciation in the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract). Recordings: En-au-gonad.ogg, En-us-gonad.oga, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Forms of gonad

  • gonads plural

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).

How common is gonad?

Gonad appears about once in every 13 million words in written English, the 109,062nd 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).

Gonad in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Frenchgonade (sex gland), couille, couillon (slang, testicles)
GermanGonade, Geschlechtsdrüse, Keimdrüse (sex gland), Eier (slang, testicles)
Portuguesegônada, gónada (sex gland)
Spanishgónada (sex gland), huevos, cojones (slang, testicles)

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 gonad come from?

From 1880 New Latin gonadēs, plural of New Latin gonas, coined from Ancient Greek γονή (gonḗ, “seed, begetting, birth, offspring”), from γίγνεσθαι (gígnesthai, “be born”).

Source: English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0), through kaikki.org (Wiktextract).