# slab

> English word · Noun · IPA /slæb/ · frequency rank #15,277

## Definitions
1. A large, flat piece of solid material; a solid object that is large and flat.
2. A paving stone; a flagstone.
3. A carton containing 24 cans (chiefly of beer).
4. An outside piece taken from a log or timber when sawing it into boards, planks, etc.
5. The slack part of a sail.
6. A very large wave.
7. The amount by which a cache can grow or shrink, used in memory allocation.
8. Part of a tectonic plate that is being, or has been, subducted.
9. A poured-concrete foundation for a building.
10. A region between two parallel lines in the Euclidean plane, or between two parallel planes in three-dimensional Euclidean space, or between two hyperplanes in higher dimensions.
11. Any of the several portions or tiers in a tax rate plan.
12. A flat, sealed plastic case that encloses a flat collector's item, such as a coin or a trading card.
13. A large, luxury pre-1980 General Motors vehicle, particularly a Buick, Oldsmobile, or Cadillac.
14. Ellipsis of slab avalanche.

## Etymology
From Middle English sclabbe, slabbe, of uncertain origin; possibly from *slap, related to dialectal slappel (“portion, piece”), along with slape (“slippery”), sleip (“smooth piece of timber”), borrowed through Old Norse sleipr from Proto-Germanic *slaipaz, from Proto-Indo-European *(s)leyb-. See also Norwegian sleip (“slippery”) and Icelandic sleipur.

## Easily confused with
- **sub** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/slab-vs-sub)
- **spa** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/slab-vs-spa)
- **sly** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/slab-vs-sly)
- **STA** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/slab-vs-sta)
- **SOB** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/slab-vs-sob)
- **SLR** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/slab-vs-slr)
- **SMA** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/slab-vs-sma)
- **SLC** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/slab-vs-slc)
- **SoA** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/slab-vs-soa)
- **SSA** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/slab-vs-ssa)
- **SSB** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/slab-vs-ssb)
- **SLE** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/slab-vs-sle)
- **SNA** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/slab-vs-sna)
- **stay** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/slab-vs-stay)
- **star** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/slab-vs-star)
- **slow** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/slab-vs-slow)
- **slip** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/slab-vs-slip)
- **snap** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/slab-vs-snap)
- **soap** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/slab-vs-soap)
- **slot** (https://plainspell.com/en/vs/slab-vs-slot)

## Common misspellings (6)
`lsab`, `salb`, `slabb`, `slba`, `sllab`, `sslab`

## Source
Compiled from Wiktionary via kaikki.org (CC BY-SA). Data vintage: 2026-05-06.
Canonical page: https://plainspell.com/en/word/slab