transfer
Verbtransfers, transferring, transferred
Noun pluraltransfers
Formstransfers, transferring, transferred
Pluraltransfers
- 1To move someone or something to a different place, person, group, or job, or to make such a move yourself, as when a worker transfers to another branch.
Please transfer the files to the new computer before noon.
She transferred the money into her savings account.
UsageUsually transfer something from one place to another: money into an account, files to a new computer.
Note
What gets moved need not be physical: a country can transfer its laws to a colony, and a suspect can try to transfer suspicion onto someone else, just as a clerk transfers files or money.
- 2The act or an instance of moving something from one place, person, or thing to another.
The transfer of authority happened smoothly after the election.
Successful transfer of skills from training to the job takes practice.
UsageUsually the transfer of something, often with to or from: the transfer of power to a new government.
Similarmove
- 3To arrange a change in who owns something or has official control of it.
He transferred the title of the property to his business partner.
The owners agreed to transfer all shares to the new investor.
UsageOften passive and with to: the title was transferred to the buyer.
Similarassign, convey, cede, deed
Note
Here what moves is ownership, not the thing: land stays put while its title is transferred by deed. Lawyers use the verb for title, shares, rights and obligations, usually passed through a formal instrument such as a deed or an assignment. Where give is vague, transfer often involves paperwork.
- 4A person who has moved, or been moved, from one team, school, military unit, or similar group to another.
The new transfer scored twice on his debut for the club.
Several transfers struggled to adjust to the faster pace of the league.
UsageOften a transfer from another club or school; before a noun: a transfer student.
Note
Club sport's sense first: a player whose registration moves from one club to another, usually through a negotiated and often paid deal. Such deals are normally completed in the transfer window, where the word works as a modifier. The same noun serves schools and armies as well: a student who changes colleges, or a soldier moved from one unit to another, is also a transfer.
Checked 5 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
- Club transfers involve moving a player's registration and may involve an agreed payment between clubs. en.wikipedia.org
- Registration normally occurs during a transfer window, but exceptions permit registration outside it. support.fifatms.com
- 5An act of leaving one transit vehicle and boarding another to continue a journey.
The route requires a transfer at the downtown hub.
Two transfers made the commute longer than expected.
UsageUsually a transfer at a station or between lines; a free transfer costs nothing extra.
Similarchange, connection
Note
A change of vehicles counted as one step of the journey, so a route with two transfers has two changes. A free transfer may be made on foot between the platforms of one station, or between bus and subway when a fare card covers it.
- 6To leave one bus, train, or other transit vehicle and board another to continue a journey.
Passengers transfer at the central station to reach the airport.
She transferred from the subway to a streetcar downtown.
UsageUsually transfer to a line or vehicle, at a station: transfer to the green line at the next stop.
Less common meanings
- 7A paper slip given to a rider, usually on a bus, that allows boarding another vehicle to finish the same journey without paying the full fare again.
He asked the driver for a transfer before getting off at the corner.
Riders must show a valid transfer when boarding the connecting route.
Note
The ticket, not the trip: a paper slip handed to a rider, usually on a bus, so that the next leg costs little or nothing. Riders ask the driver for one and show it when boarding. In some cities it also covered elevated and subway lines. Where a fare card now grants the connection, the word drifts toward the change of vehicles itself.
- 8A printed design that is pressed or ironed from one surface onto another.
He pressed a vintage transfer onto the model car's body.
The shop sells iron-on transfers for custom shirts.
Similardecal
Note
The design as an object: lettering, emblems or pictures made to be pressed or ironed onto another surface. Railway livery uses it too. D. B. McNeill, writing in 1956 on the Sligo, Leitrim & Northern Counties Railway, describes passenger stock lettered in shaded gold leaf transfers. Iron-on and heat transfers are the clothing versions, and the action behind them is the verb for moving an impression.
Checked 5 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
- D. B. McNeill wrote about the Sligo, Leitrim & Northern Counties Railway in 1956. en.wiktionary.org
- McNeill described the railway's passenger stock as lettered in shaded gold leaf transfers. en.wiktionary.org
- 9To copy or move an image or design from one surface onto another.
The artist transferred the sketch onto the canvas using carbon paper.
Heat helps you transfer the design onto a cotton shirt.
UsageUsually with onto or to: transfer a sketch onto canvas.
Similarcopy, trace, imprint, print
Note
A printmaker's and craftworker's verb. Drawings or engravings are transferred to a lithographic stone, a sketch to canvas, a design to cloth. What moves is the impression, not the original, so the destination is usually introduced with to or onto. The finished result has its own noun, the pressed or ironed design.
- 10A process in which genetic material leaves one cell and enters another.
Horizontal transfer of genetic material allows bacteria to share genes across species.
Researchers studied the transfer of mitochondrial DNA from one cell to the next.
Note
In genetics the word rarely stands alone. It appears as gene transfer, horizontal transfer, or the transfer of mitochondrial DNA. Horizontal transfer is the notable case: genes pass between cells, even across species as bacteria do, rather than down from a dividing cell to its daughters. A study may speak of transfer in general or count individual transfers.
Checked 5 Nov 2026 · 2 facts
- Horizontal transfer moves genetic information between organisms outside parent-to-offspring inheritance. ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
- Bacteria can transfer genes across species. en.wikipedia.org
- 11To move between a wheelchair and another stable seating surface, either on one's own or with help.
After months of practice, she could transfer to the car seat unassisted.
The therapist watched closely as the patient transferred from the mat to the chair.
- 12A single instance of moving a person with limited mobility from one stable surface to another, done independently or with assistance.
A safe transfer from wheelchair to bath requires careful planning.
Staff are trained to perform each transfer without straining their backs.
Note
Care settings count movement in transfers: bed to chair, chair to toilet, wheelchair to car. Lisa Lighthall Haubert and colleagues in 2015 wrote of car transfers and wheelchair loading among independent drivers. Pioneer Network's 2018 guidance pairs bed mobility and transfers as daily activities. A transfer is graded by how much help it needs, and the verb describes the wheelchair user making the move.
Checked 5 Nov 2026 · 6 facts
- Lisa Lighthall Haubert and colleagues authored the referenced study. frontiersin.org
- The study was published in 2015. frontiersin.org
- The study concerns car transfers and wheelchair loading among independent drivers. frontiersin.org
- The guidance hosted by Pioneer Network is dated 2018 in an institutional bibliography. hhs.texas.gov
- The guidance describes bed mobility and transfers as daily activities. pioneernetwork.net
- Transfer assessments grade the assistance a person needs. dhs.wisconsin.gov
- 13In bridge, a conventional bid that asks one's partner to bid the next higher suit.
- 14A process in which a disease condition affecting one side of the body disappears there and then emerges in the matching region on the opposite side.
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Practice
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Origin
From Latin trānsferō ("I bear across"). It is a distant doublet of translate, and is related to words such as collate, confer, delate, defer, prelate, and prefer.
Checked 5 Nov 2026 · 3 facts
- Transfer derives from Latin trānsferō, meaning “I bear across”. en.wiktionary.org
- Transfer and translate are distant doublets. en.wiktionary.org
- Transfer is etymologically related to collate, confer, delate, defer, prelate, and prefer. en.wiktionary.org