mouse

The word “mouse” means a small rodent with a long tail, common in houses and fields. In plain terms, a small rodent, or the desktop pointing device named after it.

“Mouse” is pronounced mows (/maʊs/ in IPA).

Here is “mouse” used in a sentence: “A mouse scurried under the fridge when the light came on.”

Depending on how it is used, “mouse” can be a noun and a verb.

The word “mouse” dates back to around 1965 and comes from Old English. From Old English mūs, tracing back to a very old Proto-Indo-European word for the animal. The computer sense was coined by engineer Bill English in 1965, after the device's cord resembled a tail.

“Mouse” is a fairly common word in modern English, usually learned at around the A1 level.

“Mouse” has 4 distinct senses listed in this dictionary. The most common is: a small rodent with a long tail, common in houses and fields.

For the small rodent, the plural is always 'mice.' For the computer pointing device, both 'mice' and 'mouses' are accepted, though 'mice' remains the more common choice among most writers.

Both are rodents with long tails, but a mouse is much smaller, with a slender body and a thin, delicate tail. A rat is noticeably larger and heavier, with a thicker tail and blunter snout.

A mouse is a separate handheld device you slide across a surface to move the on-screen pointer and click. A trackpad is a flat, touch-sensitive panel, usually built into a laptop, that you control with finger movements instead.