What is the original word for cab?

The term cab derives from the cabriolet, a two-wheeled, one-horse carriage often let out for hire. The development of modern taxicabs closely parallels that of automobiles. The first motorized taxicabs were electric-powered vehicles that began appearing on the streets of European and American cities in the late 1890s.



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In the 1820s, the word meant horse-drawn carriage, short for the French cabriolet, leap or caper. The Latin root is capreolus, wild goat.

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Today's word is cab! This was a colloquial London shortening of cabriolet, which was a type of covered carriage. The word was borrowed from the French word cabriolet, from around the 18th century, a diminutive of cabriole, meaning “a leap, a caper”.

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A cab is a taxi.

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By the mid-1800s, however, carriage services saw a new, faster model called the hansom cab. Joseph Hansom designed a smaller, lighter carriage that only required one horse to pull it. In fact, these coaches could easily traverse city streets and travel around traffic.

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Cab and taxi are two words we use to refer to a type of vehicle for hire with a driver. Although some people assume that these two words have different meanings, this is not so. In fact, there is no difference between cab and taxi. Both these words are used interchangeably throughout English-speaking countries.

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Yellow cab taxicab operators exist all around the world (some with common heritage, some without). The original Yellow Cab Company, based in Chicago, Illinois, was one of the largest taxicab companies in the United States.

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You can also refer to a taxi as a cab or a taxicab.

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synonyms: cabby, cabdriver, cabman, hack driver, hack-driver, livery driver, taximan.

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Synonyms of taxis
  • cabs.
  • taxicabs.
  • hacks.
  • limousines.
  • rickshaws.
  • rickshas.
  • jitneys.
  • water taxis.


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A hackney or hackney carriage (also called a cab, black cab, hack or London taxi) is a carriage or car for hire. A hackney of a more expensive or high class was called a remise.

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The word taxi, coming from the meter that calculates the fare (taximeter ), and cab from cabriolet , which originally was a covered horse drawn carriage. In some countries it's known as a taxi, and in others it's a cab. Most English speaking countries will know it as either or both.

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Although there are some phonetic differences, the growth of international tourism made the use of the word “taxi” more and more universal so that, nowadays, almost everyone can understand its meaning.

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