noun
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close quarters combat between fighter aircraft
-
any rough violent fight
Etymology
Origin of dogfight
1650–60; 1915 dogfight for def. 2; dog + fight
Vocabulary lists containing dogfight
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:
Mexico and Brazil are in a caramelo dogfight.
From MarketWatch ● Jun. 3, 2026
“In the skies over Korea in 1952, Royce was in the dogfight of a lifetime, a legendary dogfight,” Trump said.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 25, 2026
It was a dogfight and Italy's dogs were just that bit more menacing.
From BBC ● Feb. 7, 2026
Last weekend Osasuna winger Munoz impressed as his team won away for the first time all season, for back-to-back wins to take them away from the relegation dogfight.
From Barron's ● Jan. 30, 2026
But using her hands as planes, Lilya was able to describe the maneuvering of their aerial dogfight blow by blow, and the German pilot had to admit that this novice fighter had defeated him.
From "A Thousand Sisters" by Elizabeth Wein
Running at MIT on a $120,000 computer the size of a Buick, Russell’s “Spacewar” was a two-player game centered on dogfighting space rockets in flight around a sun.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 9, 2026
The Pentagon calls it “synchronized proximity maneuvers,” which is what happens when military bureaucrats try to describe dogfighting in space without using the word “dogfighting.”
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 30, 2025
Gen. Pamela Bondi and FBI Director Kash Patel also issued statements condemning dogfighting and lauding the conviction of Johnson.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 5, 2025
But for 47 dogs pulled from Bad Newz Kennels, there was another, less publicized development that helped change how dogs taken in large-scale dogfighting busts are treated.
From Washington Post ● Sep. 18, 2019
Before they’d even had a chance to return to the airfield, Lilya saw that Raisa Belyaeva was dogfighting with a Luftwaffe fighter plane.
From "A Thousand Sisters" by Elizabeth Wein
At every stage, you are jostled along by reports of your ongoing accomplishments—thirty thousand steps taken, fifty alien words collected, ten pirate ships dogfought.
From The New Yorker ● Aug. 10, 2016
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.
