Catching means grabbing or intercepting something that's moving through the air. When you catch a baseball, you stop it with your glove before it hits the ground. When you catch a ball thrown to you, you're using your hands, timing, and coordination to grab it mid-flight.

The word also describes getting an illness from someone else. If your sister has a cold and sneezes near you, you might worry about catching it. Diseases spread when germs move from one person to another, which is why we call them catching or contagious. The flu is catching, chickenpox is catching, but a broken arm isn't catching because you can't get it from someone else.

You can catch other things too: catch someone's attention by waving, catch a bus by reaching the stop in time, or catch someone in a lie when you discover they weren't telling the truth. A detective might catch a thief, meaning they finally capture or apprehend them.

The word suggests successfully grabbing, intercepting, or obtaining something that could have gotten away. When something is catching, it can also mean it's contagious or spreading easily, like a catching tune you can't get out of your head or a catching laugh that makes everyone else start laughing too.