Shallow has 10 different meanings across 4 categories:
Noun · Verb · Adjective · Proper Noun
A shallow portion of an otherwise deep body of water.
"The boat drifted into a shallow part of the lake where the bottom was visible through the clear water."
In plain English: A shallow person is someone who lacks depth of character and only cares about surface-level things without thinking deeply.
"The shallow part of the lake was perfect for wading with my children."
To make or become less deep.
"After years of sediment deposition, the river has grown significantly shallower near its mouth."
In plain English: To shallow something means to make it less deep by removing material from its bottom.
"He was too shallow to read more than two pages of that book before putting it aside."
lacking physical depth; having little spatial extension downward or inward from an outer surface or backward or outward from a center
"shallow water"
"a shallow dish"
"a shallow cut"
"a shallow closet"
"established a shallow beachhead"
"hit the ball to shallow left field"
not deep or strong; not affecting one deeply
"shallow breathing"
"a night of shallow fretful sleep"
"in a shallow trance"
lacking depth of intellect or knowledge; concerned only with what is obvious
"shallow people"
"his arguments seemed shallow and tedious"
Having little depth; significantly less deep than wide.
"The lake was so shallow that we could easily wade to the center without getting our knees wet."
In plain English: Shallow describes something that isn't very deep, like water you can easily touch your toes to at the bottom.
"The swimming pool is very shallow, so children can play safely without falling in too deep."
Usage: Use "shallow" to describe anything with very little vertical extent, such as a pool that is much wider than it is deep. As a verb, note that the word can mean either causing something to lose depth or becoming less deep on its own.
A surname.
"The Shallow family gathered at their ancestral home in Devon."
The word "shallow" comes from Middle English and originally meant not deep. Its roots trace back to Proto-Indo-European, where it carried the meaning of to parch or dry out.