"playa" meaning in English

See playa in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Noun

IPA: /ˈplaɪə/ [US] Forms: playas [plural]
Rhymes: -aɪə Etymology: Borrowed from Spanish playa (“beach”). Doublet of plage. Etymology templates: {{bor+|en|es|playa|t=beach}} Borrowed from Spanish playa (“beach”), {{doublet|en|plage}} Doublet of plage Head templates: {{en-noun}} playa (plural playas)
  1. (geology, US) A level area which habitually fills with water that evaporates entirely. Tags: US Hyponyms: salt flat, salt pan, alkali flat Derived forms: playa lake, playalike
    Sense id: en-playa-en-noun-TYvjyXjf Categories (other): American English, Geology, African-American Vernacular English, English entries with incorrect language header, English heteronyms, English non-rhotic pronunciations Disambiguation of African-American Vernacular English: 49 7 44 Disambiguation of English entries with incorrect language header: 46 5 50 Disambiguation of English heteronyms: 47 4 49 Disambiguation of English non-rhotic pronunciations: 46 8 46 Topics: geography, geology, natural-sciences
The following are not (yet) sense-disambiguated
Etymology number: 1

Noun

IPA: /ˈpleɪə/ [US] Audio: En-au-playa.ogg Forms: playas [plural]
Rhymes: -eɪə Etymology: From a non-rhotic pronunciation of player Etymology templates: {{nrhot|en|player|nocap=1}} non-rhotic pronunciation of player Head templates: {{en-noun}} playa (plural playas)
  1. A dude (an informal term of address or general term to describe a person, typically male). Tags: slang
    Sense id: en-playa-en-noun-c0pnJliJ
  2. A player (someone who plays the field, or has prowess in gaining romantic and sexual relationships). Tags: slang
    Sense id: en-playa-en-noun-ekqOuKXO Categories (other): African-American Vernacular English, English entries with incorrect language header, English heteronyms, English non-rhotic pronunciations, People Disambiguation of African-American Vernacular English: 49 7 44 Disambiguation of English entries with incorrect language header: 46 5 50 Disambiguation of English heteronyms: 47 4 49 Disambiguation of English non-rhotic pronunciations: 46 8 46 Disambiguation of People: 0 0 100
The following are not (yet) sense-disambiguated
Etymology number: 2

Inflected forms

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      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "es",
        "3": "playa",
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      "expansion": "Borrowed from Spanish playa (“beach”)",
      "name": "bor+"
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    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
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      "expansion": "Doublet of plage",
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        "plural"
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  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "noun",
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          "name": "Geology",
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          "word": "playa lake"
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        {
          "word": "playalike"
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          "bold_text_offsets": [
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              30,
              35
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          ],
          "ref": "2020, Diane Cook, The New Wilderness, Oneworld Publications, page 66:",
          "text": "Beyond the valley below lay a playa, a vast dried-white lake bed, its ends reaching farther than they could see.",
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            [
              86,
              91
            ]
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          "ref": "2023 September 3, Michael Sainato, “Officials investigate death at Burning Man as thousands stranded by floods”, in The Guardian, →ISSN:",
          "text": "“We are also deploying buses to Gerlach to take people to Reno who might walk off the playa. See our recommendations on when walking is viable or not. This is not likely a 24-hour operation at this time.”",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
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        "A level area which habitually fills with water that evaporates entirely."
      ],
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        {
          "word": "salt flat"
        },
        {
          "word": "salt pan"
        },
        {
          "word": "alkali flat"
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      "id": "en-playa-en-noun-TYvjyXjf",
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          "habitually"
        ],
        [
          "fill",
          "fill"
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        [
          "water",
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          "evaporate",
          "evaporate"
        ],
        [
          "entirely",
          "entirely"
        ]
      ],
      "raw_glosses": [
        "(geology, US) A level area which habitually fills with water that evaporates entirely."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "US"
      ],
      "topics": [
        "geography",
        "geology",
        "natural-sciences"
      ]
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  "sounds": [
    {
      "ipa": "/ˈplaɪə/",
      "tags": [
        "US"
      ]
    },
    {
      "rhymes": "-aɪə"
    }
  ],
  "word": "playa"
}

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  "etymology_number": 2,
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      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "player",
        "nocap": "1"
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      "name": "nrhot"
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  ],
  "etymology_text": "From a non-rhotic pronunciation of player",
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      "form": "playas",
      "tags": [
        "plural"
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    }
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  "head_templates": [
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      "expansion": "playa (plural playas)",
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        "a"
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        "A dude (an informal term of address or general term to describe a person, typically male)."
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          "_dis": "46 5 50",
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          "source": "w+disamb"
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        {
          "_dis": "0 0 100",
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            ]
          ],
          "ref": "2006, Noire [pseudonym], Thug-A-Licious: An Urban Erotic Tale, New York, N.Y.: One World, Ballantine Books, →ISBN, page 27:",
          "text": "What Pimp was asking me to do was crazy. Off the fuckin' chain. Insane. He was scheming to stick up T.C. and Miss Lady's pool hall so we could pay off G, but a playa like me was getting ready to go to college and put all that two-bit robbing and stealing shit behind me.",
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              81,
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          "text": "In the end, all the things Grace claimed to like about Marlon—that he was not a ‘playa’, that he was gentle and awkward and not interested in money—were all the reasons she left him.",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
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      ],
      "id": "en-playa-en-noun-ekqOuKXO",
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          "play the field#English"
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  "sounds": [
    {
      "ipa": "/ˈpleɪə/",
      "tags": [
        "US"
      ]
    },
    {
      "audio": "En-au-playa.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/0/03/En-au-playa.ogg/En-au-playa.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/03/En-au-playa.ogg"
    },
    {
      "rhymes": "-eɪə"
    }
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  "word": "playa"
}
{
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    "English countable nouns",
    "English doublets",
    "English entries with incorrect language header",
    "English heteronyms",
    "English lemmas",
    "English non-rhotic pronunciations",
    "English nouns",
    "English slang",
    "English terms borrowed from Spanish",
    "English terms derived from Spanish",
    "Pages with 7 entries",
    "Pages with entries",
    "Rhymes:English/aɪə",
    "Rhymes:English/aɪə/2 syllables",
    "Rhymes:English/eɪə",
    "Rhymes:English/eɪə/2 syllables",
    "en:People"
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    {
      "word": "playa lake"
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    {
      "word": "playalike"
    }
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      "expansion": "Borrowed from Spanish playa (“beach”)",
      "name": "bor+"
    },
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      "args": {
        "1": "en",
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        "play",
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      "word": "salt flat"
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      "word": "salt pan"
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      "word": "alkali flat"
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        },
        {
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              86,
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        }
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        "(geology, US) A level area which habitually fills with water that evaporates entirely."
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        "geology",
        "natural-sciences"
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      "tags": [
        "US"
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    }
  ],
  "word": "playa"
}

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    "English countable nouns",
    "English entries with incorrect language header",
    "English heteronyms",
    "English lemmas",
    "English non-rhotic pronunciations",
    "English nouns",
    "English slang",
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        "play",
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    {
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        "A dude (an informal term of address or general term to describe a person, typically male)."
      ],
      "links": [
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          "text": "What Pimp was asking me to do was crazy. Off the fuckin' chain. Insane. He was scheming to stick up T.C. and Miss Lady's pool hall so we could pay off G, but a playa like me was getting ready to go to college and put all that two-bit robbing and stealing shit behind me.",
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        {
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              86
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          "ref": "2012, Zadie Smith, NW, London: Penguin Books, published 2013, →ISBN, page 151:",
          "text": "In the end, all the things Grace claimed to like about Marlon—that he was not a ‘playa’, that he was gentle and awkward and not interested in money—were all the reasons she left him.",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
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        "A player (someone who plays the field, or has prowess in gaining romantic and sexual relationships)."
      ],
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        [
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        [
          "plays the field",
          "play the field#English"
        ]
      ],
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    }
  ],
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      "tags": [
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    },
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      "audio": "En-au-playa.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/0/03/En-au-playa.ogg/En-au-playa.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/03/En-au-playa.ogg"
    },
    {
      "rhymes": "-eɪə"
    }
  ],
  "word": "playa"
}

Download raw JSONL data for playa meaning in English (4.9kB)

{
  "called_from": "form_descriptions/1698",
  "msg": "unrecognized head form: African-American Vernacular",
  "path": [
    "playa"
  ],
  "section": "English",
  "subsection": "noun",
  "title": "playa",
  "trace": ""
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2026-02-01 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2026-01-01 using wiktextract (f492ef9 and 9905b1f). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.