oat

noun

ˈōt 

often attributive

1

a

: any of several grasses (genus Avena)

especially : a widely cultivated cereal grass (A. sativa)

b

: a crop or plot of the oat

also : the seed of an oat

—usually used in plural but singular or plural in construction

2

archaic : a reed instrument made of an oat straw

see also:

feel one's oats

Illustration of oat

• oat 1a

Examples of oat in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Popular flour substitutes include rice, oat and almond flours, tapioca, corn and potato starches and xanthan gum. —Jolene Thym, Mercury News, 23 Apr. 2026

Whole or halved walnuts are easy to sprinkle on top of oats and salads, or as a nutritious boost for baked treats like brownies. —Abby Norman, Verywell Health, 21 Apr. 2026

The Milk Bar Pie Doughnut resembles Tosi's signature Milk Bar Pie and is made with an unglazed shell doughnut filled with buttery pie filling, dipped in caramel icing and rolled in oat cookie topping, then dusted with a sweet, powdered coating. —Kelly McCarthy, ABC News, 20 Apr. 2026

Oatmeal is typically made by processing oat groats through steaming, rolling or cutting, and the oats themselves are naturally gluten-free and do not contain gluten proteins. —Daryl Austin, USA Today, 19 Apr. 2026

Word History

Etymology

Middle English ote "the grain of the oat plant, the plant itself," going back to Old English āte (weak feminine noun), of uncertain origin

Note: Old English āte has been compared with regional Dutch aate, oote "wild oats" (West and Zeeland Flanders), West Frisian and Groningen Dutch oat. (These contrast with Dutch haver, denoting cultivated oats, a reflex of the Common Germanic word for the grain.) Michiel de Vaan, in an addenda to the online etymologiebank.nl, believes that the Flanders words are semantic extensions of regional aat "food," of general Germanic origin (see eat entry 2), though this hypothesis would scarcely explain the Old English word. Jan de Vries (Nederlands Etymologisch Woordenboek, Brill, 1971) hypothesizes that the Low Country words may have been borrowed from English.

First Known Use

before the 12th century, in the meaning defined at sense 1a

Phrases Containing oat

• oat cell
• oat grass
• oat milk
• wild oat

Rhymes for oat

• bloat
• boat
• choate
• coat
• cote
• dote
• float
• gloat
• goat
• groat
• haute
• moat

Kids Definition

oat

noun

ˈōt 

: a grain that is widely grown for its long loose clusters of seeds which are used for human food and for livestock feed

oaten

ˈōt-ᵊn

adjective