Skip to main content
PlainSpell

handball

noun, verb

handball is spelled H-A-N-D-B-A-L-L: 8 letters and 2 syllables. It appears 1.3 times per million words in written English, the 25,070th most frequent word form (wordfreq, 2021 data). As a noun, handball means “A ball held in, or thrown with, the hand, especially one used for one of the various games in later senses, below” (English Wiktionary, September 2026). The plural of handball is handballs.

How many letters and syllables are in handball?

Letters8: H-A-N-D-B-A-L-L
Syllables2 (from its American pronunciation)
In writing1.3 times per million words; the 25,070th most frequent word form
Wrong spellings searchednone measured in search

Sources: letters and syllables from the English Wiktionary's hyphenation or pronunciation and the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary; written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).

How common is handball?

Handball appears 1.3 times per million words in written English, the 25,070th 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).

How do you pronounce handball?

  • US
  • Australia

Handball 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-us-handball.ogg, EN-AU_ck1_handball.ogg, Wikimedia Commons (author and licence on each file's page).

Words people confuse with handball

Also written: hand ball (one word or two).

Sources: English Wiktionary (homophones, alternative spellings).

Forms of handball

  • handballs plural, present, singular, he/she/it
  • handballing participle, present
  • handballed participle, past

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

What does handball mean?

The meanings the English Wiktionary records, quoted as written there (source below).

noun

  1. 1

    A ball held in, or thrown with, the hand, especially one used for one of the various games in later senses, below.

  2. 2

    archaicThe hollow rubber ball squeezed to produce spray from a perfume bottle or other atomizer.

  3. 3

    Any of various traditional ball games played outside between two goals often at a considerable distance from each other.

  4. 4

    Any of several games similar to fives, in which a ball is hit by the hand against a wall or within a walled court (the chief variants now being Gaelic handball and American handball).

  5. 5

    A sport played on a rectangular court between two teams of seven players each, using a small ball struck only with the hands; team handball.

  6. 6

    AustraliaA schoolyard game in which a bouncy ball is struck with the hand, played on an improvised court on the asphalt or pavement.

  7. 7

    An act of passing a football by holding it with one hand and hitting it with the other.

  8. 8

    The offence of a player other than the goalkeeper touching the ball with the hand or arm on the field during play.

verb

  1. 1

    To manually load or unload a container, trailer, or to otherwise manually move bulk goods (often on pallets) from one type of transport receptacle to another.

  2. 2

    To illegally touch the ball with the hand or arm.

    If the defender handballs in the penalty area, a penalty is awarded.

  3. 3

    To (legally) pass a football by holding it with one hand and hitting it with the other.

  4. 4

    AustraliaslangTo pass responsibility for a task or problem to someone else, often to avoid dealing with an undesirable task or a tricky question.

  5. 5

    slangTo insert a hand into someone's anus.

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

Handball in Spanish, French, German and Portuguese

LanguageWords
Frenchhandball (team sport), ballon de handball, ballon, balle (ball in team sport), main (football offence), handball américain (American: sport)
GermanHandball (team sport), Handspiel, Hand (football offence)
Portugueseandebol, handebol (team sport), bola de andebol, bola de handebol (ball in team sport), mão (football offence)
Spanishbalonmano, handball (team sport)

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 handball come from?

From hand + ball.

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

What to look up after handball