1. Move slowly; in the case of people or animals with the body near the ground
   "The crocodile was crawling along the riverbed";
   - creep
    
2. (water sport) swim by doing the crawl
   "European children learn the breast stroke; they often don't know how to crawl"
    
3. Show submission or fear
   "The dog crawled under the table during the thunderstorm";
   - cringe, cower, grovel
    
4. Be full of
   "The old cheese was crawling with maggots"
    
5. Feel as if crawling with insects
   "My skin crawled — I was terrified"
    
6. (computing) index linked files or web sites, e.g. so they can later be searched
   "Search engines crawl the web to update their indexes"

1. A slow mode of locomotion on hands and knees or dragging the body
   "a crawl was all that the injured man could manage";
   - crawling, creep, creeping
    
2. A swimming stroke; arms are moved alternately overhead accompanied by a flutter kick
   "She won the race using the front crawl";
   - front crawl, Australian crawl
    
3. A very slow movement
   "the traffic advanced at a crawl"

Derived forms: crawled, crawling, crawls

Type of: bend, feel, flex, go, locomote, locomotion, motion, move, movement, pullulate, swarm, swim, swimming stroke, teem, travel

Encyclopedia: Crawl