Verbal means done in spoken words rather than in writing. A verbal agreement, verbal warning, verbal abuse.
A verbal agreement is legally binding in many circumstances and impossible to prove, which is the whole of the advice about it. In employment, a verbal warning is the first formal step. Strictly, verbal means in words of any kind and oral means spoken, so a written contract is verbal too — but almost nobody keeps that distinction. Note nonverbal; verbally; and that in grammar a verbal is a form derived from a verb.
1adjectiveverbalDone in spoken words rather than in writing.
“It was a verbal agreement and worth about as much as one.”
synonyms: oral, spoken
verbal is a quality of being in words.
Also accepted in games: oral
Latin verbalis comes from verbum, a word — the same root as verb, verbose and proverb. Verbal means of words, and the narrowing to spoken words happened in English rather than in Latin.
Proto-Indo-European
*werh₁-
Latin
verbālis — belonging to a word
Old French
verbal
English, today
verbal
From Old French verbal, from Latin verbālis (“belonging to a word”). Equivalent to verb + al.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA