soap
- Top 5000
Sense 1
- noun
- A2
A substance used with water to clean your hands, your body or your clothes, sold as a hard block or as a liquid.
Wash your hands with soap for at least twenty seconds.
The soap slipped out of my wet hands onto the floor.
This soap smells of lavender and never dries my skin.
There was no soap left in the dispenser by lunchtime.
Common collocations: a bar of soap · liquid soap · soap and water · wash with soap · hand soap · soap dish
Part of: Hygiene, Cleaning and repairs, Shops and shopping
Sense 2 · less common
- noun
- B2
A television story about the everyday lives of a group of people, shown in many short parts week after week.
She never misses her favourite soap on weekday evenings.
Millions of viewers have followed that soap for over thirty years.
He got his first acting job in a hospital soap.
Common collocations: a TV soap · a long-running soap · star in a soap · soap opera · watch a soap
Part of: Film and television, Media
Sense 3 · less common
- verb
- B2
To rub soap onto a part of the body or onto a thing while washing it.
He soaped his arms and then rinsed them under warm water.
Soap the sponge well before you start on the windows.
Common collocations: soap your hands · soap the sponge · soap and rinse · soap yourself down
Part of: Hygiene, Cleaning and repairs
Forms
- past
- soaped
- plural
- soaps
- third_person
- soaps
- past_participle
- soaped