AWOL
Americanadjective
noun
idioms
adjective
Etymology
Origin of AWOL
First recorded in 1915–20; A(bsent) W(ith)o(ut) L(eave)
Explanation
If you're absent without permission, you're awol. Your mom may announce she'll be awol from work for the rest of the week, and that you can find her in the backyard lying in the hammock. When a student is truant from school — simply doesn't show up, with no explanation or excuse — she is awol. Likewise, a volunteer at an animal shelter who skips his weekly shift is awol. This term is actually an acronym, an abbreviation of the military phrase "absent without leave." You'll often see it spelled in all capital letters: AWOL. The term became popular around World War II in the US military, and it caught on with civilians in the 1960s.
Vocabulary lists containing awol
Unwind
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Fallen Angels
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"In Life and Leadership" by Colin Powell
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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.
Soup is the obvious recommendation for days when appetite has gone AWOL, but two in particular stand out as personal MVPs: the “tiny everything” pastina and rotisserie chicken congee.
From Salon • Jan. 29, 2026
Videos abound of Roombas terrorizing pets, making epic messes and going AWOL.
From The Wall Street Journal • Jan. 12, 2026
Two hours later, around midnight, his commander responded: “I’m reporting you as AWOL, unauthorized abandonment of the unit. It was nice fighting together.”
From Seattle Times • Nov. 25, 2023
Julia Lawson, an environmental scientist with the agency, said there are several potential reasons California’s wolverine — only the second specimen to be verified by experts in the last century — has gone AWOL.
From Los Angeles Times • Jul. 29, 2023
If there are any more, it could cause a cascading failure in the grid—and with so many electrical workers AWOL, there’s no telling when such a thing would be resolved.
From "Dry" by Neal Shusterman and Jarrod Shusterman
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.
