quadruped

noun

quad·ru·ped ˈkwä-drə-ˌped

Synonyms of quadruped next

: an animal having four feet

quadruped adjective

quadrupedal

kwä-ˈdrü-pə-dᵊl

ˌkwä-drə-ˈpe-

adjective

Did you know?

The quadrupeds include almost all the mammals. (Among the exceptions are whales, bats, and humans.) The Greek equivalent of this Latin word is tetrapod. However, the two are not identical, since the tetrapod classification includes bipeds such as birds, in which two of the limbs are no longer used for walking. Insects all have six legs, of course, and in the sea there are eight-legged octopods (including the octopus). But there are no animals of any kind with an odd number of legs.

Examples of quadruped in a Sentence

Horses and cows are quadrupeds.

Recent Examples on the Web Of course, people knew from everyday observations that these quadrupeds can turn in the air. —

Manon Bischoff, Scientific American, 24 July 2023 Now, of course, Boston Dynamics is the authority in legged robots, with its Atlas biped and Spot quadruped. —

IEEE Spectrum, 31 July 2023 But quadrupeds have made some enormous four-legged strides since the late 1 990s and early 2000s. —

IEEE Spectrum, 17 Apr. 2023 And in fact, most other quadrupeds are versatile like this: four-legged animals frequently use their front limbs to interact with the world around them for non-locomotion purposes. —

IEEE Spectrum, 29 Mar. 2023 Yet the magazine continues to explore, optimistically, the challenges and discoveries that promise to shape the lives of bipeds, quadrupeds and every other creature on Earth. —

Ted Scheinman, Smithsonian Magazine, 23 Mar. 2020 But some took to occasionally resting or running on all fours for greater stability and over time evolved into quadrupeds. —

Sarah Lewin Frasier, Scientific American, 1 June 2015 That includes the Ornithischia branch, which produced many famous quadruped dinosaurs, such as Triceratops, Stegosaurus, and Ankylosaurus. —

Jason Bittel, National Geographic, 20 May 2019 That transition from stable quadruped to confident biped took a long time as new members of the human family tree evolved. —

Jason Daley, Smithsonian, 5 July 2018 See More

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'quadruped.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.