asleep
Americanadverb
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in or into a state of sleep.
He fell asleep quickly.
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into a dormant or inactive state; to rest.
Their anxieties were put asleep.
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into the state of death.
adjective
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sleeping.
He is asleep.
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dormant; inactive.
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(of the foot, hand, leg, etc.) numb.
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dead.
adjective
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in or into a state of sleep
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in or into a dormant or inactive state
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(of limbs, esp when the blood supply to them has been restricted) numb; lacking sensation
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euphemistic dead
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of asleep
before 1000; Middle English o slæpe, aslepe, Old English on slǣpe; see a- 1, sleep
Explanation
If you're asleep, you're not awake and reading this. A baby might find it hard to fall asleep without being held and rocked. Some people snore when they're asleep, and others have strange, vivid dreams. In either case, their eyes are closed and they're in a state of rest that's close to being unconscious. You can also use asleep figuratively, to mean "numb," as when your leg falls asleep, or "inattentive," as when the opposing soccer team is asleep and your team beats them easily.
Vocabulary lists containing asleep
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.
Few artists can draw from both worlds, but they collided in her debut, When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?—pillow-soft vocals and blown-out drums, singer-songwriter lullabies and sonic battering rams.
From The Wall Street Journal • Oct. 29, 2025
Famously, Eilish made Grammy history in 2020 as the youngest person to sweep all four major categories in a single year, for her goth-electro masterwork “When We All Fall Asleep, Where Do We Go?”
From Los Angeles Times • Oct. 11, 2023
Asleep or not, they are dreaming, but their dreams are nightmares that are, by turns, inventive and liberating, grotesque and suffocating.
From New York Times • Sep. 22, 2022
Billie Eilish made history when she won all four of the Grammys' biggest awards in a single night for her debut album, When We All Fall Asleep Where Do We Go?
From BBC • Jul. 14, 2022
Asleep was the way Harry liked the Dursleys best; it wasn’t as though they were ever any help to him awake.
From "Harry Potter And The Goblet Of Fire" by J. K. Rowling
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.
