Water Puns

This entry is about water puns! It’s closely related to the Punpedia entry on ocean puns, but with a tighter emphasis on water, and including puns about rivers, freshwater topics, liquid, ice and rain to name a few of the main topics. There is also a bit of cross-over with the beach puns entry, so check that out if you’re interested.

As usual, the images and visual puns at closer to the end of the article, so scroll down if that’s what you’re looking for. And if you’ve got a terrible/amazing pun that isn’t in this entry, please post it in the comments and one of our curators will add it to this entry.

Water Puns List

Each item in this list describes a pun, or a set of puns which can be made by applying a rule. If you know of any water related puns that we’re missing, please let us know in the comments at the end of this page!

  • What are → Water: As in “Water you doing out so late tonight?” and “Water you doing tomorrow?”
  • What are we → Watery: As in “Watery going to do?” and “Watery doing today, friends?”
  • What about → Water boat: As in “Water boat we have tofu curry for dinner tonight?” and “Water boat Ching? Does she want to come to the beach too?”
  • What do → Water: As in “Water you think about this?”
  • What her → Water: As in “I know water problem is.” and “Do you know water mother thinks about this?”.
  • Do you → Dew: As in “Dew want to grab a coffee some time?” and “How dew do?”
  • Whatever → Waterever: As in “Waterever, I don’t care.” and “Do waterever you want”.
  • Each → Beach: As in “Beach of us have our own towel”.
  • Bitch → Beach: As in “Those beaches don’t know me!” and “She says you were being a bit beachy“.
  • Damn → Dam: As in “This is the best damned water pun you’ve ever heard.” and “These dam otters are stealing all my trees.”
  • *dam*: Most words containing “dam” can be made into “dam” puns: damage, damnation, madam, goddamn, adamant, damsel, fundamental.
  • Shallow: As in “That comment was very shallow.”
  • Like → lake: As in “Swim lake a fish.” and “Lake a fish out of water.”
  • Current: As in “Currently we have no other options.”
  • *ways → *waves: Words than end in “ways” can be made into bad wave puns: alwaves (always), railwaves (railways), sidewaves, pathwaves, lengthwaves, doorwaves.
  • Fathom: A “fathom” is a unit of length equal to 6 feet (~1.8m) and is most commonly used in reference to the depth of water. Example sentences: “I can’t fathom what she means.” and “It’s completely unfathomable!”
  • Acquaintance → Aquaintance: As in “I don’t know her well, she’s just an aquaintance“.
  • No → Snow: As in “There’s snow way you’re coming with us.”
  • Tired → Tide: As in “It’s late, and I’m getting tide of water puns.”
  • Tidy → Tidey: As in “After the party we need to tidey the beach.”
  • Tied → Tide: As in “I’m tide up at the moment, can someone else help?” and “Yep, they tide the knot!”
  • Other → Otter: As in “It was just the otter day.”
  • Flow: As in “The conversation was flowing quite nicely for a while.” and “The rhythm and flow are just perfect.”
  • Seizure → Seazure: As in “If I read one more water pun I’m going to have a seazure.”
  • App* → Carpp*: If a word starts with “app” you can replace it with “carpp” to create a really bad pun on the freshwater fish. Examples include: carppear (appear), carpproach (approach), carpply (apply). You can find more “app*” words in this list.
  • Stream: As in “I’m streaming a video.” and “I can’t stream because my connection is too slow.”
  • You’re in → Urine: As in “Urine for a treat!” and “Urine for a fleecing!”
  • Wait → Wet: As in “I’ll just wet here.” and “We were wetting for a gap.”
  • Ponder: As in “I love to just sit and ponder the meaning of life.” And some similar ones: pondtificate (pontificate) pondtoon (pontoon), ponderously.
  • Waded: Along with walking through water, this can mean to “read laboriously through a long piece of writing”, so a water pun could be by using it with this definition: “Wading through your last comment was difficult.” It could also just be used in place of “walk”.
  • Wish → Fish: As in “I just fish we had more time!” and “If you rub the lamp you get three fishes“.
  • Tad → Shad: A “shad” is a common herring-like fish which lives in the sea and breeds in rivers.
  • Bubbly: “bubbly” has a “this water is bubbly” sense and a “he has a really bubbly personality” sense.
  • Boy → Buoy: As in “It’s a buoy!” and “His buoyfriend is a great person”.
  • Issue → Fishue: As in “That’s not the fishue here though.” and “I was fishued a sign for parking without a ticket”.
  • *able → *abubble: Words ending in “able” can be converted to terrible bubble puns by replacing it with “abubble”: reasonabubble (reasonable), availabubble (available), enabubble (enable), comfortabubble (comfortable), valuabubble (valuable), constabubble (constable), acceptabubble, capabubble, inevitabubble, vegetabubble, suitabubble, variabubble, vulnerabubble, profitabubble, acceptabubble, sylabubble, reliabubble, … Many more shameful puns like this can be made with the help a of list like this one.
  • *bably → *bubbly: As in “I’m probubbly going to stick around for a bit longer” and “It was indescribubbly mysterious” and “All the while he just impertububbly paced along the shore”.
  • *pear → *peir: As in “Then all of a sudden she dissapeired!” and “After appeiring to check his watch, he quickly ran away.” and “Don’t you think speir fishing is cruel?”.
  • ?id* → Squid*: If a word begins with “?id” where ‘?’ represents any letter, then this prefix can sometimes be replaced with “squid”. For example: squiddle (middle), squidlife crisis (midlife crisis), squidget (midget), squiddle (riddle), squidiculous (ridiculous), squideotape (videotape), squiddish (yiddish), squidth (width), squidow (widow), squidget (widget).
  • Kid* → Squid*: The prefix “kid” can be replaced with “squid” as follows: squidding (kidding), squidnapped (kidnapped), squidney (kidney), squid (kid).
  • Wail → Whale: As in “Poor thing, he’s been whaling over his grandmother who recently passed.” and “A good whale can help one overcome grief”.
  • El* → Eel*: A word that starts with “el” can often be an eel pun: eelection (election), eelse (else), eelement (element), eelectricity, eeliminate, eelite, eelephant, eelectron, eeleven, eelegant, eeligible, eelderly, eelicit, eelated, eelusive, eeligibility, eelapse, eelevator, eelbow, eelastic, eeloquent, eelipse.
  • Defin* → Dolphin: As in “We dolphinitely need more time to finish the mission.” and “What is the dolphinition of this word?” and “Please dolphine this word.” and “It’s the dolphinitive source of Nordic history.”
  • *tual* → *shoal*: A “shoal” can refer to a large group of fish, or an area of shallow water, or an underwater sand bank. If a word contains “tual” it can often be replaced with “shoal” for a cute little pun: actshoal (actual), actshoality (actuality), intellectshoal (intellectual), ritshoal (ritual), spiritshoal, mutshoally, eventshoal, eventshoally, conceptshoal, conceptshoalise, virtshoal, contractshoal, factshoal, factshoally, perpetshoal, textshoal, contextshoal, perceptshoal, punctshoal, instinctshoal, actshoally, habitshoally.
  • Should* → Shoald*: As mentioned above, a “shoal” can refer to a large group of fish, or an area of shallow water, or an underwater sand bank. We can use “shoal” be used to make puns like: shoald (should), shoalder (shoulder), shoaldering.
  • Bas* → Bass*: If a word begins with “bas” it can be replaced with “bass”, the name of a common European freshwater perch: bassically, basskets, basstard, bassic, basshful, bassin.
  • *cy → *sea: If a word ends in “cy” it’s an easy “sea” pun: polisea, agensea, democrasea, currensea, emergensea, efficiensea, tendensea, frequensea, fansea, constituensea, pregnansea, accurasea, redundansea, bureaucrasea, presidensea, legasea, conspirasea, mersea, privasea, bankruptsea, consistensea, literasea, urgensea, deficiensea, dependency, consultansea, tenacity, isea (icy), secrecy, intimasea.
  • Se* → Sea*: Some words that start with just “se” also have a “sea”-ish sound: seacret, searious, seargeant, seacretion, seacure, seacurity, seacondary, seacretariat, seaconds, seacrete, searum, searenity, searvitude.
  • Sea*: Most words starting with “sea” are easy sea puns: season, seasonal, seated, searingly, sealants, seam.
  • See* → Sea*: If a word starts with “see” it can often be replaced with “sea” to create a simple sea pun: seaminly, seads, seaker, seathe, seap, seak, sean, sea (see).
  • Sealant / Sealing / Seal: Easy seal puns can be made with words starting with “seal” (e.g. sealant, seal) or “ceil” (e.g. sealing).
  • Or* → Oar*: If a word starts with “or” it can be replaced with “oar” for a neat little boat pun. Some examples: oarganisation, oariginally, oarange, oarchestra, oargan, oarbit, oarnament, oarthodoxy, oariental, oarnaments, oarchid, oardering.
  • Simmer → Swimmer: As in “I left the pot swimmering and now my vegetable curry is burnt!” and “Hey swimmer down, there’s no need to turn this into a fight”.
  • Or → Oar: As in “Let’s go oar we’ll be late!” and “Should we swim oar keep sunbaking?”.
  • Crappy → Crappie: A “crappie” is a North American freshwater fish. “Crappy” is used to describe something or poor quality.
  • Purpose → Porpoise: As in “I didn’t do it on porpoise!” and “What is the porpoise of this?”
  • *sib* → *ship*: If a word contains “sib” it can usually be replaced with “ship” to create a terrible pun. For example: posshiply (possibly), accesshipility (accessibility), incomprehenshiple, feashipble, irresponshipble, invishipble, ostenshipbly, revershipble, vishipble. An example sentence might be: “I am responshiple for my puns.”
  • Someone → Salmon: As in “Will salmon please help me?” and “Salmon’s at the door”.
  • Opportunity → Op-perch-tuna-ty: As in “I’m glad I got an op-perch-tuna-ty to say this pun.”
  • Well: The word “well” can mean “in a good or satisfactory way” and also “a shaft dug into the ground to extract water, oil, etc.”, so it’s a simple pun. An example sentence: “Very well, I’ll stop making water puns now.”
  • Well/Welcome → Whale/Whalecome: As in “Whalecome to our home!” and “Whale, whale, whale, what do we have here?”.  Whale puns can be made with many more words like welfare (whalefare), welsh (whalesh) and wellness (whaleness). Check out the entry on whale puns for more.
  • Row/Roe: “Row” as in “row your boat” and “roe” as in fish or shellfish eggs, are two words that can be inserted into many other words: roetine/rowtine (routine), rowmans/roemans (romans), rowtation/roetation (rotation), rowd/roed (rowed), rowse (rose), rowl (roll), rowp, rowmantic, rowbust, rowbot, rowgue, roest. Check out the boat puns entry for more.
  • Kil* → Krill*: Kill, kilogram, killer, killing, kilowatt are all words that can be punned with “krill” (the microscopic shrimp-like ocean critters). For example: “I just bought a krillogram of tofu” and “Krilling sentient creatures is often morally wrong”
  • Combine → Combrine: As in “With our power combrined we should be able to defeat them.” and “It’s what you get when you combrine salt and water”. Similar puns can be made for most words ending in “bine”: turbrine (turbine), concubrine (concubine), columbrine (columbine).
  • *ice: Some words that end in “ice” an be very simple ice puns: price, nice, advice, device, twice, slice, rice, sacrifice, vice, suffice, mice, spice, entice, lice, splice.
  • Jus* → Juice*: As in “There can be no juicetification of this behaviour!” and “Juicet three dollars?! Is that all?” and “Juicetice has been served.” There are of course many more juice puns of this variety: juicetify, juicetifyable, injuicetice, unjuicetifyable, etc.
  • Adjust → Adjuicet: As in “There will be an adjuicetment period.” and “We need to adjuicet the course of this conversation”.
  • Court → Quart: As in “The supreme quart.” and “He’s been quarting her for months.”
  • Will → Well: As in “It’s just a lack of well power.” and “Well you marry me?” and “You well regret this.”
  • Esteem → Esteam: As in “She has great self-esteam.” and “I hold her in high esteam.”
  • Creak → Creek: As in “The stairs creeked as I walked up.”
  • Run → Rain: As in “She rains so fast!” and “He’s raining amok.”.
  • Tap: As in “Tap out! Her water puns are too good!” and “I heard a tap at the door.”
  • Lock → Loch: As in “If there’s any more water puns, I’ll loch the thread.” and “No shit, Sherloch.”
  • *lock → *loch: If a word ends in “lock”, it’s a lovely opportunity for a lake pun: bloch, cloch, floch, deadloch, padloch, hilloch, interloch, warloch, sunbloch, unbloch, hemloch.
  • Seem → Steam: As in “Things are not always as they steam.”
  • *hale → *hail: As in “Inhail deeply, then exhail slowly.”
  • Flake: As in “Yeah, I thought you might flake on me.” and “Cornflakes aren’t all that healthy.”
  • *late → *lake: Terrible lake puns can be made by replacing the “late” suffix with “lake”: calculake, stimulake, translake, contemplake, manipulake, circulake, accumulake, congratulake, congratulaketions, speculake, correlaketed (correlated), violaketed (violated), inarticulake.
  • I s* → Ice s*: Any phrase which has the word “I” and word after it which begins with “s” can be made into an ice pun. Here are a couple of examples: “Ice see dead people.” and “And ice stood there for a moment, completely stunned.” and “Ice simply have no idea.”
  • I see → Icey: As in “Icey what you did there.” and “Icey dead people.”
  • Boy l* → Boil l*: If a sentence has the word “boy” followed by a word starting with “l”, we can make a water pun. For example: “I thought a boil like you would have some manners.” and “The young boil left the room abruptly.”

Water-Related Phrases

Common phrases, idioms and cliches which are related to water can be used for some subtle and witty word play. Here is a list of the water themed phrases that we’ve found so far:

  • When it rains, it pours
  • I’ll be damned
  • Drowning in sorrow
  • To dampen one’s enthusiasm/spirits
  • Break the ice
  • Watered down
  • You shore can
  • Go with the flow
  • You’re in deep water
  • Dry humour
  • Don’t piss off the alligator until you’ve crossed the river
  • Keep at bay
  • Keep the pot boiling
  • That’s water under the bridge
  • Kick up a storm
  • She’s in hot water
  • Rain on your parade
  • Off the deep end
  • Open the floodgates
  • Channel surfing
  • Run out of steam
  • The calm before the storm
  • Sleep with the fishes
  • Blow off steam
  • In hot water
  • Until hell freezes over
  • Take a raincheck
  • Skating on thin ice
  • Rubber duck
  • Trim one’s sails
  • Slippery when wet
  • Water over the dam
  • Went storming off
  • In every life a little rain must fall
  • My head is swimming
  • Pour it on thick
  • Bored to tears
  • Between the devil and the deep blue sea
  • Muddy the water
  • You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make her drink
  • Throwing out the baby with the bath water
  • As white as snow
  • As helpful as a screen door on a submarine
  • Better than a slap in the face with a wet fish
  • Mexican wave
  • A fine kettle of fish
  • A big fish in a small pond
  • Plain sailing
  • Binge drinking
  • Blood, sweat and tears
  • Behind the clouds, the sun is shining
  • Body surfing
  • Rising tide
  • Let’s cross that bridge when we come to it
  • Chasing rainbows
  • Paddle your own canoe
  • Babble like a brook
  • Laugh like a drain
  • Crocodile tears
  • Lame duck
  • Sitting duck
  • Soft drink
  • Don’t rock the boat
  • If it looks like a duck and sounds like a duck…
  • If your ship doesn’t come in, you have to row out to meet it
  • Drink like a fish
  • He’s fishing for compliments
  • Hook, line and sinker
  • If today was a fish, i’d throw it back in the river
  • Lay there like a beached whale
  • Rats abandon a sinking ship
  • River of tears
  • As sharp as a sack of wet mice
  • As sharp as a wet corn flake
  • Stew in his own juice
  • She’s not the only fish in the sea
  • Still waters run deep
  • Tip of the iceberg
  • After the rain comes a rainbow
  • We might as well get our ears wet
  • Wet behind the ears
  • All’s well that ends well
  • Well’s run dry
  • Whatever floats your boat
  • Cold as ice
  • A wet bird never flies at night
  • A whale of a time
  • Cottage by the lake
  • Couldn’t punch your way out of a wet paper bag
  • Cross that bridge when we get to it
  • Cry me a river
  • Son’t give a damn
  • All in the same boat
  • Dry as a bone
  • Duck the question
  • Eat drink and be merry
  • Even at the turning of the tide
  • The tides have turned
  • Every cloud has a silver lining
  • A fish out of water
  • A drop in the ocean
  • Full steam ahead
  • Full head of steam
  • Get your ducks in a row
  • Getting soaked (as in cheated)
  • Going against the tide
  • Head in the clouds
  • That shore is (funny/sad/long/etc.)

Water-Related Words

There are many more puns to be made than could be documented in this Punpedia entry, and so we’ve compiled a list of water-related concepts for you to use when creating your own puns:

afloat, alligator, amazon river, amphibian, aqua, aquarium, aquatic, aqueduct, aqueous, aquifer, bath, bath water, bathe, bay, beach, beverage, bilge, billabong, bird bath, boat, boating, body of water, boggy, boiling, boiling point, bottled water, bottom of the sea, brackish, breakwater, bridge, brim, brine, brook, bubble, bucket, canal, canoe, carbonated water, channel, cistern, cloud, condensation, coral, crab, creek, crocodile, crystal clear, dam, damp, dampen, deep, deep blue sea, deep water, dehydration, deluge, desalination, dew, diarrhoea, dishwasher, dissolve, distillation, distilled water, dive, diving, dock, dolphin, douse, downstream, drainage, drench, drink, drinking, drinking water, drizzle, droplet, drought, drown, dry, dryer, duck, dunk, eddy, eel, effervescent, estuary, evaporation, falls, faucet, fin, fish, fishermen, fishing, float, flood, floodwater, fluid, flush, flush toilet, fountain, freeze, freezing, freezing point, fresh water, freshwater, frog, gills, glacier, ground water, groundwater, gutter, H2O, hail, half empty, half full, hard water, heavy water, holy water, hot water, humidity, hydrant, hydrate, hydration, hydraulic, hydroelectricity, hydrogen, hydrophilic, hydrophobic, hydrosphere, hygiene, ice, iceberg, inlet, irrigate, irrigation, jellyfish, jet ski, juice, kayak, kelp, lagoon, lake, lime water, liquefied, liquid, liquid water, litre, marine, marine mammal, marsh, melt, melt water, mineral water, mist, moist, moisture, navy, nile, ocean, ocean spray, oceanic, orca, otter, patter, pee, perspiration, phlegm, piddle, pier, pint, pirate, piss, plankton, pond, pond lily, pond water, pool, pour, precipitation, puddle, pump, quart, rain, rainbow, raincoat, rainy, reeds, rinse, river, riverbed, river basin, running water, sail, saline, salinity, saliva, salt lake, saltwater, scald, scuba, sea, seaborne, seal, seasick, seawater, seaweed, seven seas, sewage reservoir, shallow, shark, ship, shipwreck, shoal, shore, shower, simmer, sink, siphon, skim, slobber, snorkel, snow, snowflake, soak, soda, sodden, soft water, solvent, sonar, sopping, splash, splashing, spring, spring water, sprinkle, squid, squirt, steam, storm, stream, string ray, submerge, submerse, sunken, surfing, swamp, swash, sweat, swell, swimmer, swimming, tadpole, tap, tap water, tear, teardrop, tidal force, tide, tidepool, toilet, torrent, torrential rainfall, umbrella, underwater, upstream, urine, vapour, wade, wash, washing, wastewater, water bomb, water buffalo, water cycle, water filter, water fowl, water gun, water park, water pipe, water polo, water skiing, water slide, water soluble, water spout, water supply, water tank, water tight, water treatment, water works, waterboard, watercolour, watercourse, waterfall, watering hole, waterlogged, watermark, waterway, watery, wave, well, wet, wet season, whale, whirlpool, wring out, trout, turtle, sea turtle, tortoise, wetland, loch, fish pond, catfish, tuna, mud, blowfish, bydrobiology, marine biologist, catchment, crayfish, lobster, reef, moat, sea life, swan, seagull, sturgeon, open water, paddle, watermelon, conductive, spurt

Water Jokes

If you’re looking for some very corny water jokes, you’ve come to the right place. All of these one-liner-style water jokes use puns in their punchline (whether homophonic, homographic, or based on a slang phrase or cliche).

  • What do you call a duck that refuses to go in the water? – A chicken!
  • What keeps a dock floating above water? – Pier pressure!
  • Did you hear the watermelon joke? – It’s pitiful.
  • Is it dangerous to swim on a full stomach? – No, it’s just more fun in water.
  • Why is the letter T like an island? – Because its in the middle of water!
  • What do you call a guy with no arms or legs floating in the water? – Bob
  • Why is it bad to joke about boiling water? – Because it gets all steamy.
  • How do you make holy water? – You boil the hell out of it!
  • How does Moses make his tea?  – Hebews it.
  • Why do seals swim in salt water? – Because pepper water makes them sneeze!
  • What eight letters can you find in water from the Arctic Ocean? – H to O
  • What vegetable is forbidden on all ship? – Leeks!
  • What did the trout say when it swam into a concrete wall? – Dam!
  • What type of specialist can carry out operations underwater? – Sturgeon
  • Where do fish wash? – In a river basin!
  • Where do fish keep their money? – In river banks.
  • What do you call the small tributaries of the main river in Cairo? – Juveniles
  • Why didn’t the hipster swim in the river? – It was too mainstream.
  • What happened when the scientist tried to capture some fog? – She mist!
  • Why did the student study hydrology? – Because she had a great thirst for knowledge.
  • Who is the world’s greatest underwater spy? – Pond. James Pond.
  • All the toilets in New York’s police stations have been stolen. Police have nothing to go on.
  • Why is tea so therapeutic? – Because boiling the water raises your self of steam.

Water Pun Images

Below is a collection of water-related visual puns and meme-type images. If you’ve created your own visual water puns or found one that we’ve missed, please post us a link in the comments section 🙂

Water Pun Conversations & Battles

Here’s a small selection of conversations and threads where water was the general topic of word play. Some of the comments may lead toward ocean puns, but in general the pun battles/conversations stay close to the water theme. If you’ve found any threads or messenger/iPhone screenshots that are water-themed but aren’t included here, please post a comment at the bottom of the page!

Did this Punpedia entry help you?

Did you find the water-related pun that you were looking for? If so, great! Otherwise, please let us know what you were looking for in the comments, below! Are you looking for puns for text messages, facebook, twitter, or some other social media platform? Would you like to see more water-related pun images? Or perhaps you just want more water puns for your photo captions? Whatever the case, please let us know, and help us improve this Punpedia entry. If you’re got any water puns (image or text) that aren’t included in this article, please submit them in the comments and one of our curators will add it as soon as possible. Thanks for visiting Punpedia 🙂