break

break

synonyms, antonyms, definitions, examples & translations of break in English

English Online Dictionary. What means break‎? What does break mean?

English

Pronunciation

  • enPR: brāk, IPA(key): /bɹeɪk/, [bɹ(ʷ)eɪ̯k]
  • (obsolete) enPR: brēk, IPA(key): /bɹiːk/
  • (Early Modern) IPA(key): /brɛːk/
  • Rhymes: -eɪk
  • Homophone: brake

Etymology 1

From Middle English breken, from Old English brecan (“to break”), from Proto-West Germanic *brekan, from Proto-Germanic *brekaną (“to break”), from Proto-Indo-European *bʰreg- (“to break”). Doublet of bray.

Verb

break (third-person singular simple present breaks, present participle breaking, simple past broke or (archaic) brake, past participle broken or (nonstandard) broke)

  1. (transitive, intransitive) To separate into two or more pieces, to fracture or crack, by a process that cannot easily be reversed for reassembly.
    1. (transitive, intransitive) To crack or fracture (bone) under a physical strain.
  2. (transitive) To divide (something, often money) into smaller units.
  3. (transitive) To cause (a person or animal) to lose spirit or will; to crush the spirits of.
    1. To turn an animal into a beast of burden.
  4. (intransitive) To be crushed, or overwhelmed with sorrow or grief.
  5. (transitive) To interrupt; to destroy the continuity of; to dissolve or terminate.
    1. (transitive, theater) To end the run of (a play).
  6. (transitive) To ruin financially.
  7. (intransitive, obsolete) To fail in business; to go broke, to become bankrupt.
    • 1791-92, Jane Austen, ‘A Collection of Letters’, Juvenilia:
      ‘I knew he was in some such low way—He broke did not he?’
  8. (finance, intransitive) Of prices on the stock exchange: to fall suddenly.
  9. (transitive) To violate; to fail to adhere to.
  10. (intransitive, of a fever) To go down, in terms of temperature, indicating that the most dangerous part of the illness has passed.
  11. (intransitive, of a spell of settled weather) To end.
  12. (intransitive, of a storm) To begin or end.
  13. (intransitive, of morning, dawn, day etc.) To arrive.
  14. (transitive, gaming slang) To render (a game) unchallenging by altering its rules or exploiting loopholes or weaknesses in them in a way that gives a player an unfair advantage.
  15. (transitive, intransitive) To stop, or to cause to stop, functioning properly or altogether.
    1. (specifically, in programming) To cause (some feature of a program or piece of software) to stop functioning properly; to cause a regression.
  16. (transitive) To cause (a barrier) to no longer bar.
    1. (specifically) To cause the shell of (an egg) to crack, so that the inside (yolk) is accessible.
    2. (specifically) To open (a safe) without using the correct key, combination, or the like.
  17. (transitive) To destroy the arrangement of; to throw into disorder; to pierce.
  18. (intransitive, of a wave of water) To collapse into surf, after arriving in shallow water.
  19. (intransitive) To burst forth; to make its way; to come into view.
  20. (intransitive) To interrupt or cease one's work or occupation temporarily; to go on break.
  21. (transitive) To interrupt (a fall) by inserting something so that the falling object does not (immediately) hit something else beneath.
  22. (transitive, ergative) To disclose or make known an item of news, a band, etc.
  23. (intransitive, of a sound) To become audible suddenly.
    • c. 1843, George Lippard, The Battle-Day of Germantown, reprinted in Washington and His Generals "1776", page 45 [5]:
      Like the crash of thunderbolts[...], the sound of musquetry broke over the lawn, [...].
  24. (transitive) To change a steady state abruptly.
  25. (transitive, with for) To (attempt to) disengage and flee to; to make a run for.
  26. (copulative, informal) To suddenly become.
  27. (intransitive, of a male voice) To become deeper at puberty.
  28. (intransitive, of a voice) To alter in type due to emotion or strain: in men, generally to go up, in women, sometimes to go down; to crack.
  29. (intransitive, of a sauce or emulsion) To de-emulsify.
  30. (transitive) To surpass or do better than (a specific number); to do better than (a record), setting a new record.
  31. (sports and games):
    1. (transitive, tennis) To win a game (against one's opponent) as receiver.
    2. (intransitive, billiards, snooker, pool) To make the first shot; to scatter the balls from the initial neat arrangement.
    3. (transitive, backgammon) To remove one of the two men on (a point).
  32. (transitive, military, most often in the passive tense) To demote; to reduce the military rank of.
  33. (transitive) To end (a connection); to disconnect.
  34. (intransitive, sports) To counter-attack.
  35. (transitive, obsolete) To lay open, as a purpose; to disclose, divulge, or communicate.
  36. (intransitive) To become weakened in constitution or faculties; to lose health or strength.
  37. (transitive) To destroy the strength, firmness, or consistency of.
  38. (transitive) To destroy the official character and standing of; to cashier; to dismiss.
    • January 11, 1711, Jonathan Swift, The Examiner No. 24
      when I see a great officer broke.
  39. (intransitive) To make an abrupt or sudden change; to change gait.
  40. (intransitive, archaic) To fall out; to terminate friendship.
    • c. 1700 Jeremy Collier, On Friendship
      To break upon the score of danger or expense is to be mean and narrow-spirited.
  41. (computing) To terminate the execution of a program before normal completion.
  42. (programming) To suspend the execution of a program during debugging so that the state of the program can be investigated.
  43. (computing) To cause, or allow the occurrence of, a line break.
Conjugation
Quotations
  • For quotations using this term, see Citations:break.
Synonyms
  • (ergative: separate into two or more pieces): burst, bust, shatter, shear, smash, split, bisect
  • (ergative: crack (bone)): crack, fracture
  • (transitive: turn an animal into a beast of burden): break in, subject, tame
  • (transitive: do that which is forbidden by): contravene, go against, violate
  • (intransitive: stop functioning): break down, bust, fail, go down (of a computer or computer network)
Antonyms
  • (antonym(s) of “transitive: cause to end up in two or more pieces”): assemble, fix, join, mend, put together, repair
  • (antonym(s) of “tennis, intransitive: break serve”): hold
Hyponyms
Derived terms
Translations

Noun

break (plural breaks)

  1. An instance of breaking something into two or more pieces.
    Synonym: split
  2. A physical space that opens up in something or between two things.
    Synonyms: breach, gap, space; see also Thesaurus:interspace, Thesaurus:hole
  3. An interruption of continuity; departure from or rupture with.
  5. A rest or pause, usually from work.
    Synonyms: time-out; see also Thesaurus:pause
    1. (UK, education) A time for students to talk or play between lessons.
      Synonyms: (UK) playtime, (US) recess
    2. A scheduled interval of days or weeks between periods of school instruction; a holiday.
  6. A short holiday.
    Synonyms: day off, time off; see also Thesaurus:vacation
  7. A temporary split with a romantic partner.
  8. An interval or intermission between two parts of a performance, for example a theatre show, broadcast, or sports game.
  10. A significant change in circumstance, attitude, perception, or focus of attention.
    them's the breaks
  11. (finance) A sudden fall in prices on the stock exchange.
  12. The beginning (of the morning).
    Synonyms: crack of dawn; see also Thesaurus:dawn
  13. An act of escaping.
  14. (computing) The separation between lines, paragraphs or pages of a written text.
  15. (computing) A keystroke or other signal that causes a program to terminate or suspend execution.
  16. (programming) Short for breakpoint.
  17. (British, weather) A change, particularly the end of a spell of persistent good or bad weather.
  18. (sports and games):
    2. (tennis) A game won by the receiving player(s).
    3. (billiards, snooker, pool) The first shot in a game of billiards.
    4. (snooker) The number of points scored by one player in one visit to the table.
    5. (soccer) The counter-attack.
    6. (golf) The curve imparted to the ball's motion on the green due to slope or grass texture.
    7. (surfing) A place where waves break (that is, where waves pitch or spill forward creating white water).
    8. (horse racing) The start of a horse race.
    9. The opening of packages of cards for a collectible card game, often for further distribution to paying customers.
  19. (dated) A large four-wheeled carriage, having a straight body and calash top, with the driver's seat in front and the footman's behind.
  20. Alternative form of brake (“cart or carriage without a body, for breaking in horses”)
  21. (equitation) A sharp bit or snaffle.
  22. (music) A short section of music, often between verses, in which some performers stop while others continue.
  23. (music) The point in the musical scale at which a woodwind instrument is designed to overblow, that is, to move from its lower to its upper register.
  24. (music) The transition area between a singer's vocal registers; the passaggio.
  25. (geography, chiefly in the plural) An area along a river that features steep banks, bluffs, or gorges (e.g., Upper Missouri River Breaks National Monument, US).
  26. (obsolete, slang) An error. [late 19th–early 20th c.]
Usage notes
  • (short section of music): The instruments that are named are the ones that carry on playing, for example a fiddle break implies that the fiddle is the most prominent instrument playing during the break.
Derived terms
Translations

References

Etymology 2

Clipping of breakdown (the percussion break of songs chosen by a DJ for use in hip-hop music) and see also breakdancing.

Noun

break (plural breaks)

  2. (music) A section of extended repetition of the percussion break to a song, created by a hip-hop DJ as rhythmic dance music.
Derived terms
  • Amen break
  • breakcore

Verb

break (third-person singular simple present breaks, present participle breaking, simple past and past participle breaked)

  1. (music, slang) To B-boy; to breakdance.
  2. (rare, mainly historical or a misspelling) To brake.
Related terms
  • breaker

References

  • “break”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
  • 2001. The Garland Encyclopedia of World Music: North America. Garland Publishing. Ellen Koskoff (Ed.). Pgs. 694-695.

Anagrams

  • Abrek, Baker, Brake, baker, barke, brake

French

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /bʁɛk/

Etymology 1

Borrowed from English break.

Noun

break m (plural breaks)

  1. break (pause, holiday)
    Synonym: pause
    C’est l’heure de faire un break. ― It's time to take a break.
  2. (tennis) break (of serve)
Derived terms
  • balle de break

Etymology 2

From earlier break de chasse, from English shooting brake.

Noun

break m (plural breaks)

  1. (automotive) estate car, station wagon
    Antonym: berline

Further reading

  • “break”, in Trésor de la langue française informatisé [Digitized Treasury of the French Language], 2012.

Italian

Etymology

Unadapted borrowing from English break.

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /ˈbrɛk/
  • Rhymes: -ɛk

Noun

break m (invariable)

  1. (gay culture) break (intermission or brief suspension of activity)

Interjection

break

  1. break! (boxing)

References

Portuguese

Pronunciation

Noun

break m (invariable)

  1. clipping of breakdance

Spanish

Etymology

Borrowed from English break.

Pronunciation

  • IPA(key): /ˈbɾeik/ [ˈbɾei̯k]
  • Rhymes: -eik

Noun

break m (plural breaks)

  1. break (pause)
  2. (tennis) break

Further reading

  • “break”, in Diccionario de la lengua española [Dictionary of the Spanish Language] (in Spanish), online version 23.8, Royal Spanish Academy [Spanish: Real Academia Española], 2024 December 10

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Related Words

breaks

breaking

breakfast

breakdown

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This article based on an article on Wiktionary. The list of authors can be seen in the page history there. The original work has been modified. This article is distributed under the terms of this license.