potato

potato — noun

1. an underground tuber, usually round or oval, that people cook and eat, or the gr

1.nounA1
Definition

an underground tuber, usually round or oval, that people cook and eat, or the green plant that produces it

Example

Lena baked a potato and ate it with butter.

bake a potato

Three potatoes lay in the basket beside the kitchen door.

plural countable use

Common collocations
  • baked potato
  • boiled potatoes
  • potato plant
  • peel potatoes
  • potato soup
Synonyms
  • vegetable

    a broader everyday word; a potato is one kind of vegetable

  • tuber

    a more technical word, often used in science or farming

  • spud

    an informal word for potato, especially in everyday speech

Grammar Patterns

bake a potato

grow potatoes

potato plant

Usage Note

Most everyday uses are countable: a potato, two potatoes. When you mean the plant rather than the food, English often says potato plant to make that meaning clear.

Common Mistakes

I bought potato for dinner.
I bought a potato for dinner.
Use a when you mean one whole potato.

Synonym discussion

Sense: noun/1

For this sense, potato is the normal everyday word for the common starchy tuber people boil, bake, fry, or grow in the ground. Spud is an informal alternative, often heard in speech or seen on menus, but it is less neutral than potato. Tuber is a technical word for an underground plant part, so it fits science or farming contexts better than daily conversation. Sweet potato may sit near potatoes in a shop, but it is a different crop with a sweeter taste and is not the same thing in ordinary English. Use potato for the usual food and, when needed, for the plant that grows it.

potato ↗spudtubersweet potato

Common collocations

Nouns

  • potato plant
  • potato soup
  • potato salad
  • baked potato

Phrases

  • bake a potato
  • peel potatoes
  • grow potatoes

Etymology

SpanishEnglish

Potato entered English from Spanish patata. That Spanish form grew out of names used in the Americas for related underground crops, and English later kept potato as the everyday name for the common starchy tuber. The word now also refers to the plant that produces it.