breadboard

1 of 2

noun

bread·​board ˈbred-ˌbȯrd How to pronounce breadboard (audio)
variants or less commonly bread board
plural breadboards also bread boards
1
: a board designed for working dough or for cutting or serving bread
With towels around their middles and their hair tucked up, Grandma and Mary Alice rolled out endless pastry on big breadboards.Richard Peck
On a large round breadboard beside Mrs. Plunkett there were several kinds of bread, which she cut very slowly …William Trevor
2
: a board on which mounted components are breadboarded
Yamakawa developed an ignition system to maximize efficiency while using the least amount of gasoline. He created it as a breadboard (an assembly of separate transistors, capacitors, and other electronic parts), but was unable to fuse them together on a chip before the money ran out.Daniel McNeill et al.

breadboard

2 of 2

verb

breadboarded; breadboarding; breadboards

transitive verb

: to make an experimental arrangement of (something, such as an electronic circuit or a mechanical system) to test feasibility

Examples of breadboard in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web
These examples are automatically compiled from online sources to illustrate current usage. Opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.
Noun
Shapiro is a legal philosopher at Yale University, but as a child, his mathematician father—who worked at Bell Labs—sparked an interest in computing by bringing home various components, like microchips, resistors, diodes, LEDs, and breadboards. Jennifer Ouellette, Ars Technica, 27 May 2023 Attached to it is an optical breadboard housing the tracking and acquisition systems. IEEE Spectrum, 1 Dec. 2022 It’s made from natural beech wood and can be used as a cutting board and a breadboard. Claire Rutter, Rolling Stone, 25 Oct. 2023 Trimble, enthralled with the idea of GPS as a free information utility ripe for commercial exploitation, bought the rights to an HP GPS breadboard in the summer of 1982. IEEE Spectrum, 19 Apr. 2018 The Pottery Barn trestle table with breadboard leaves accommodates many people without overtaking the room. Marni Elyse Katz, BostonGlobe.com, 2 June 2023 Coraggio Textiles Dining Area The custom breadboard-style plank dining table is made of elm wood taken from antique Chinese gates. Kelly Allen, House Beautiful, 30 Mar. 2023 Like the breadboard method, which showed how someone might have tainted the capsules. Chicago Tribune, 27 Oct. 2022 Use twine to tie the wreath onto the handle of a breadboard. Megan Boettcher, Better Homes & Gardens, 28 Aug. 2022
Verb
An outside party used Max to breadboard the wildly popular music software Ableton Live. Catherine Sinow, Ars Technica, 26 Sep. 2020

Word History

First Known Use

Noun

1761, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Verb

1944, in the meaning defined above

Time Traveler
The first known use of breadboard was in 1761

Dictionary Entries Near breadboard

Cite this Entry

“Breadboard.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary, Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/breadboard. Accessed 6 Nov. 2024.

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