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:
The material consists of porous, hollow carbon spheres containing orderly radial nanochannels, along with substantial pore space and surface area.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 8, 2026
They are creative projects with the sneaky ability to hollow you out sometimes, especially when the story requires you to watch someone move through a series of the hardest days of their life.
From Salon ● Jul. 28, 2026
The line is like Nolan nudging his audience to say, check this out: a human pyramid of Greek commandos packed into a dark hollow.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 20, 2026
"Now they tell me he will be gone -- my heart feels hollow."
From Barron's ● Jul. 15, 2026
I take an involuntary step back as the space seems to get tighter, pushing in on me, and my heart hammers in the hollow at the bottom of my throat.
From "Red Flags and Butterflies" by Sheryl Azzam
The coffers have their own rhythm; indirect lighting turns the hollows into shadow gradients.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 22, 2026
Instead, they appeared along the sides of the ridges and within the sandy hollows between them.
From Science Daily ● Mar. 14, 2026
A nation that teaches fear as a civic virtue hollows itself out from within.
From Salon ● Dec. 21, 2025
These include tree planting or the digging of dips and hollows into the landscape, but are often hampered because a large proportion of river catchments are on private land.
From BBC ● Dec. 9, 2025
She spots flashes of The Taker in the dim grottos and murky hollows where the bears and the cougars might be.
From "A Heart in a Body in the World" by Deb Caletti
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
You can never call me that again, without feeling it the hollowest pretence!
From A Beautiful Alien by Julia Magruder
He laid his hand on my back, whereat I groaned my hollowest.
From Helmet of Navarre by Bertha Runkle
The idea that literature is a mere matter of writing is seen to be the hollowest of misconceptions the moment you run over any list of enduring names.
From Vanishing Roads and Other Essays by Richard Le Gallienne
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
"Wall cabinets, sofas, coffee tables, dining tables, and chairs vanished in an instant. It was as if the entire building had been hollowed out," Wang told the Xiaoxiang Morning Herald.
From Barron's ● Jul. 7, 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
“Radio was hollowed out by the corporations, before its utility to the American citizen ended,” Socolow said.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 22, 2026
A numbness in a numbness hollowed into a numbness...
From "Fahrenheit 451" by Ray Bradbury
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
But opaque AI loans and excessive leverage — ‘credit termites’ — are hollowing out the economy.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 21, 2026
Other credit bureaus are noting a similar hollowing out of the middle.
From MarketWatch ● May 4, 2026
Automation had been hollowing out middle-skill work since the early 2000s, quietly eliminating the clerical roles, bookkeeping jobs and sales positions that once absorbed India's graduates.
From BBC ● Mar. 29, 2026
She herself was smoothing out a paddle to use in stirring the syrup, and just the day before Deydey had started hollowing a peeled, smooth piece of basswood for a trough.
From "The Birchbark House" by Louise Erdrich
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.
