awake
Americanverb (used with or without object)
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awakes,
present (3rd person singular)
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awoke,
past participle, past
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awaked,
past
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awoken,
past participle
-
awaking
present participle
-
to wake up; rouse from sleep.
I awoke at six with a feeling of dread.
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to rouse to action; become active.
His flagging interest awoke.
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to come or bring to an awareness; become cognizant (often followed byto ).
She awoke to the realities of life.
adjective
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waking; not sleeping.
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vigilant; alert.
They were awake to the danger.
verb
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to emerge or rouse from sleep; wake
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to become or cause to become alert
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(usually foll by to) to become or make aware (of)
to awake to reality
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Also: awaken. (tr) to arouse (feelings, etc) or cause to remember (memories, etc)
adjective
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not sleeping
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(sometimes foll by to) lively or alert
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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reawakeverb
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awakeableadjective
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half-awakeadjective
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unawakeadjective
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unawakeableadjective
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unawakedadjective
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unawakingadjective
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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awakesimple
-
awakessimple
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have awokeperfect
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have awokenperfect
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has awokeperfect
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has awokenperfect
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am awakingprogressive
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are awakingprogressive
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is awakingprogressive
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have been awakingperfect progressive
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has been awakingperfect progressive
Past
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awakedsimple
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awokesimple
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had awokeperfect
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had awokenperfect
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was awakingprogressive
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were awakingprogressive
-
had been awakingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of awake
First recorded before 1000; Middle English awaken, Old English awacen, past participle of awæcnan; see a 1, waken
Explanation
When you're awake, you're conscious and aware of your surroundings. When you're not awake, you're asleep. If you are reading this, you are indeed awake. Most people are awake during the day and asleep at night, but if you work the night shift or suffer from insomnia, you might also be awake at night. When awake is used as a verb, it means "wake up:" "I watched my kitten awake from a deep sleep and yawn." Awake comes from two Old English roots, āwæcnan, "to arise," and āwacian, "to revive."
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:
Sometime after 3 a.m. that July 8, the roar of the incoming surge jolted Santosh Adhikari awake.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 9, 2026
After arriving in the morning, the players stayed awake until evening.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 8, 2026
"I was awake the other week for four hours in the night, and my watch was like 'wow, great sleep!' - I literally was awake from 01:00 until 05:00," she says.
From BBC ● Sep. 3, 2026
Somewhere very early, I learned that rattling meant somebody was awake.
From Salon ● Aug. 31, 2026
So I stayed awake thinking about my destiny, and when I got tired of that, I cursed pixies and gnomes, but mostly pixies.
From "Rump: The (Fairly) True Story of Rumpelstilskin" by Liesl Shurtliff
The Amazon MGM film, which stars Ryan Gosling as a teacher-turned-astronaut who awakes on a spaceship with a mission to save Earth from a dimming sun, has earned nearly $257 million in total domestically.
From Barron's ● Apr. 12, 2026
When she awakes, he lies to her about what happened, and season one's cliffhanger ending leaves viewers with the strong impression that Ellie is well aware of the deception.
From BBC ● Apr. 12, 2025
When Phillips awakes, she’ll squeeze her eyes closed and try and coax the vision to return.
From Seattle Times ● Oct. 31, 2023
Seventeen years later, he’s still under a roof, as are the violin and cello, and he awakes each day to what he calls the music of the gods.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 4, 2022
An owl hoots; a bird sleeping in a laurel bush awakes and flutters its wings.
From "On the Far Side of the Mountain" by Jean Craighead George
Peter Ricketts, formerly the head of Britain’s Foreign Office, said he had awaked to the news of Mrs. May “appealing to others to help her out of dilemmas of her own making.”
From New York Times ● Dec. 14, 2018
A few minutes earlier, Tangie Griffin had awaked to screaming; she was used to young Shaquem crying when he bumped his partially developed left hand.
From Washington Post ● Apr. 19, 2018
Thibault has discussed playing Delle Donne at multiple positions, even admitting he’s awaked in the middle of the night with new offensive ideas.
From Washington Post ● Feb. 10, 2017
The hotel staff, realizing it had awaked a lioness, swiftly rustled up an empty room on the 39th floor, where Ms. Jones ordered up a bottle of Champagne and fresh orange juice.
From New York Times ● Sep. 18, 2015
Retired worn out; slept soundly; awaked by mate telling me that both man of watch and steersman missing.
From "Dracula" by Bram Stoker
So, by the time the game ended, Sasaki’s three-inning start seemed like a murky nightmare the Dodgers awoke from in a sweat.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 3, 2026
When that man awoke he called for help.
From BBC ● Jul. 1, 2026
I awoke in Washington on a recent Thursday the proud owner of a pair of Donald Trump’s favorite shoes.
From Slate ● Jun. 5, 2026
"This awoke not just Michoacan, but all of Mexico," she told AFP while surrounded by bodyguards to keep would-be assassins at bay.
From Barron's ● May 18, 2026
Khrushchev awoke that morning—Saturday, October 27—feeling a little bit better.
From "Fallout: Spies, Superbombs, and the Ultimate Cold War Showdown" by Steve Sheinkin
GRENOBLE, France—One night last week, Tour de France leader Tadej Pogacar was fast asleep on the shores of Lake Geneva when he was suddenly awoken by a knock at his hotel-room door.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 23, 2026
Yellow jersey wearer Pogacar was awoken after the Dane at 05:00 to undergo doping controls and suggested the effects of Vingegaard's disrupted sleep could have been a factor in his crash.
From BBC ● Jul. 19, 2026
Sajili said he was awoken by a fellow passenger as the triple-decker ferry began to tilt precariously.
From Barron's ● Jan. 26, 2026
Villagers have awoken to a replica pony standing tall in place of a bronze metal statue which was cut down to its hooves last summer.
From BBC ● May 30, 2025
Harry tried to recall what he had been dreaming about before he had awoken.
From "Harry Potter And The Goblet Of Fire" by J. K. Rowling
I do luxuriate in awaking to no news deadlines, playing pickleball when court fees are low and cycling to the beach on a weekday morning.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 12, 2026
After awaking to his pet Labrador retriever, Hank, “going crazy,” Huntington Beach resident Jim Sena went to check his backyard, where he spied a masked intruder.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 26, 2023
After awaking, he tweeted that he was fortunate he fell ill in Britain instead of in the United States.
From Fox News ● Aug. 5, 2020
“We are unwilling to spin out our awaking thoughts into the phantasms of sleep, which often continueth praecogitations, making Cables of Cobwebbes and Wildernesses of handsome groves.”
From New York Times ● Jan. 17, 2020
I kept thinking I had slept and was awaking after dreaming of a tiger.
From "Life of Pi" by Yann Martel
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.
