hollow
Americanadjective
-
hollower,
comparative
-
hollowest
superlative
-
having a space or cavity inside; not solid; empty.
a hollow sphere.
-
having a depression or concavity.
a hollow surface.
-
sunken, as the cheeks or eyes.
-
(of sound) not resonant; dull, muffled, or deep.
a hollow voice.
-
without real or significant worth; meaningless.
a hollow victory.
-
insincere or false.
hollow compliments.
-
hungry; having an empty feeling.
I feel absolutely hollow, so let's eat.
noun
-
hollows
plural
-
an empty space within anything; a hole, depression, or cavity.
-
a valley.
They took the sheep to graze in the hollow.
-
Foundry. a concavity connecting two surfaces otherwise intersecting at an obtuse angle.
verb (used with object)
-
hollows,
present (3rd person singular)
-
hollowed,
past participle, past
-
hollowing
present participle
-
to make hollow (often followed byout ).
to hollow out a log.
-
to form by making something hollow (often followed byout ).
to hollow a place in the sand;
boats hollowed out of logs.
verb (used without object)
-
hollows,
present (3rd person singular)
-
hollowed,
past participle, past
-
hollowing
present participle
adverb
idioms
adjective
-
having a hole, cavity, or space within; not solid
-
having a sunken area; concave
-
recessed or deeply set
hollow cheeks
-
(of sounds) as if resounding in a hollow place
-
without substance or validity
-
hungry or empty
-
insincere; cynical
-
the capacity to eat or drink a lot without ill effects
adverb
noun
-
a cavity, opening, or space in or within something
-
a depression or dip in the land
verb
-
to make or become hollow
-
to form (a hole, cavity, etc) or (of a hole, etc) to be formed
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Adjectives
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
hollowsimple
-
hollowssimple
-
have hollowedperfect
-
has hollowedperfect
-
am hollowingprogressive
-
are hollowingprogressive
-
is hollowingprogressive
-
have been hollowingperfect progressive
-
has been hollowingperfect progressive
Past
-
hollowedsimple
-
had hollowedperfect
-
was hollowingprogressive
-
were hollowingprogressive
-
had been hollowingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of hollow
First recorded before 900; Middle English holow, holw(e), Old English holh “a hollow place”; akin to hole
Explanation
If something is hollow, it is empty on the inside. A chocolate Easter bunny looks like so much chocolate until you realize that it is hollow and quickly eaten. The idea of emptiness is apparent in the other uses for hollow too. A valley between mountains is called a hollow and if you're really thin, you may have hollow cheeks. Things like words and promises are hollow if the person uttering them does not intend to keep them. And a hollow victory is not very satisfying, as it means that you have reached your goal, but lost something more important along the way.
Vocabulary lists containing hollow
The SAT: Words to Capture Tone, List 5
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The New SAT: Words to Capture Tone
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Excerpt from "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer"
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
“Lumpy close-out with hollow barrels with low tide, fam.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 14, 2026
To support Henry Bacon’s Parthenon-like building and Daniel Chester French’s colossal statue, builders had to sink 122 hollow steel cylinders deep into the marshy soil to reach bedrock, then fill each pillar with concrete.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 19, 2026
But his pleas for personal trust ring hollow.
From Salon ● Aug. 8, 2026
A nanoscale hollow cavity is surrounded by a porous shell, forming a confined environment where reactants can accumulate.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 6, 2026
Scientists had filled his hollow limbs with test subjects, including mice, guinea pigs, and reptiles.
From "Fallout: Spies, Superbombs, and the Ultimate Cold War Showdown" by Steve Sheinkin
“A persistent contraction of this kind hollows out the pipeline of future experienced workers, causing declines in aggregate productivity as well as imposing cohort-specific scarring.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 29, 2026
Instead, they appeared along the sides of the ridges and within the sandy hollows between them.
From Science Daily ● Mar. 14, 2026
The second species is the ring-tailed glider, and just like its Australian cousin the greater glider, it lives in the hollows of tall trees.
From BBC ● Mar. 6, 2026
A nation that teaches fear as a civic virtue hollows itself out from within.
From Salon ● Dec. 21, 2025
“What’s changed about hollows that they can get into loops now?”
From "Hollow City" by Ransom Riggs
Were the words that the cast spoke and sung hollower than they’d been 2½ weeks ago?
From Washington Post ● Jun. 26, 2022
His assurances of restraint, dubious from the start, now ring hollower than ever.
From Slate ● Jun. 24, 2022
Itgen isn’t sure why larger genomes lead to hollower hearts.
From Scientific American ● Feb. 2, 2022
His hair grayer and thinner than in his mugshot from five years ago, and his cheeks a little hollower, Cho, now 56, sat through the two-week trial in a gray pinstripe suit, mustard tie and glasses.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 20, 2016
Then the clicking of its spikes against the stone suddenly turned into a deeper, hollower sound.
From "The Maze Runner" by James Dashner
In a world sorely lacking global leadership, champions of human rights stand poised to earn only the hollowest of victories.
From Washington Post ● Dec. 20, 2018
Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey was nominated for the presidential race, but it was the hollowest of victories.
From Washington Times ● Aug. 27, 2018
The struggle between Prater's cat and Prater's cat's conscience was short, and ended in the hollowest of victories for the former.
From Tales of St. Austin's by P. G. (Pelham Grenville) Wodehouse
"Vengeance, sir, is the hollowest of all the mockeries that go to make up life."
From The Sea-Hawk by Rafael Sabatini
"Myself, arch-traitor to myself; My hollowest friend, my deadliest foe, My clog whatever road I go."
From The Marriage of William Ashe by Mrs. Humphry Ward
Once a byword for joyful excess, Havana has been hollowed by blackouts, departures and deep uncertainty about its future.
From Barron's ● Aug. 18, 2026
Second, it hollowed out Congress’ power to enforce our constitutional promise of racial equality at the polls, insisting that Congress lacked the power to do more than prohibit purposeful racial discrimination.
From Slate ● Jul. 8, 2026
What's unique about the east of Germany today is that these birth rates are happening within a population that was so recently – and so rapidly – hollowed out.
From BBC ● Jun. 29, 2026
Some fear their community will be hollowed out entirely, with many residents already pushed from land they have farmed for decades for the $15 billion project.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 28, 2026
As a hot dry wind clears the air, I can see Frightful, my peregrine falcon, sitting in front of the six-foot-in- diameter hemlock tree that I hollowed out for a home.
From "On the Far Side of the Mountain" by Jean Craighead George
“There’s essentially a hollowing out of the middle,” said Jared Walczak, senior fellow at the Tax Foundation.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 5, 2026
Having promised to reverse what he called the "hollowing out" of the armed forces, the settlement Healey was offered on Monday was not enough for him.
From BBC ● Jun. 11, 2026
L.A.’s declining share of a contracting film and television industry is hollowing out its middle class, a group Pratt rarely talks about when homelessness is not at issue.
From Slate ● Jun. 3, 2026
In the 1980s, William Julius Wilson sounded the alarm on job loss hollowing out black communities.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 14, 2026
When Zora spoke you were aware of the skin stretching over these cheekbones and hollowing out between her jaws, the tight mask it made, banshee-like, with her blue eyes piercing through above.
From "Middlesex: A Novel" by Jeffrey Eugenides
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
