waste
Americanverb (used with object)
-
wastes,
present (3rd person singular)
-
wasted,
past participle, past
-
wasting
present participle
-
to consume, spend, or employ uselessly or without adequate return; use to no avail or profit; squander.
to waste money; to waste words.
- Synonyms:
- expend, fritter away, dissipate, misspend
- Antonyms:
- save
-
to fail or neglect to use.
to waste an opportunity.
-
to destroy or consume gradually; wear away.
The waves waste the rock of the shore.
- Synonyms:
- erode
-
to wear down or reduce in bodily substance, health, or strength; emaciate; enfeeble.
to be wasted by disease or hunger.
-
to destroy, devastate, or ruin.
a country wasted by a long and futile war.
-
Slang. to kill or murder.
verb (used without object)
-
wastes,
present (3rd person singular)
-
wasted,
past participle, past
-
wasting
present participle
-
to be consumed, spent, or employed uselessly or without giving full value or being fully utilized or appreciated.
-
to become gradually consumed, used up, or worn away.
A candle wastes in burning.
-
to become physically worn; lose flesh or strength; become emaciated or enfeebled.
-
to diminish gradually; dwindle, as wealth, power, etc..
The might of England is wasting.
-
to pass gradually, as time.
noun
-
wastes
plural
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useless consumption or expenditure; use without adequate return; an act or instance of wasting.
The project was a waste of material, money, time, and energy.
- Synonyms:
- dissipation
-
neglect, instead of use.
waste of opportunity.
-
gradual destruction, impairment, or decay.
the waste and repair of bodily tissue.
- Synonyms:
- consumption, emaciation, decline, diminution
-
devastation or ruin, as from war or fire.
- Synonyms:
- desolation, spoliation
-
a region or place devastated or ruined.
The forest fire left a blackened waste.
-
anything unused, unproductive, or not properly utilized.
-
an uncultivated tract of land.
-
a wild region or tract of land; desolate country, desert, or the like.
-
an empty, desolate, or dreary tract or extent.
a waste of snow.
-
anything left over or superfluous, as excess material or by-products, not of use for the work in hand.
a fortune made in salvaging factory wastes.
-
remnants, as from the working of cotton, used for wiping machinery, absorbing oil, etc.
-
Physical Geography. material derived by mechanical and chemical disintegration of rock, as the detritus transported by streams, rivers, etc.
-
garbage; refuse.
-
wastes, excrement.
adjective
-
not used or in use.
waste energy; waste talents.
-
(of land, regions, etc.) wild, desolate, barren, or uninhabited; desert.
-
(of regions, towns, etc.) in a state of desolation and ruin, as from devastation or decay.
-
left over or superfluous.
to utilize waste products of manufacture.
-
having served or fulfilled a purpose; no longer of use.
-
rejected as useless or worthless; refuse.
to salvage waste products.
-
Physiology. pertaining to material unused by or unusable to the organism.
-
designed or used to receive, hold, or carry away excess, superfluous, used, or useless material (often in combination).
a waste pipe; waste container.
-
Obsolete. excessive; needless.
idioms
-
go to waste, to fail to be used or consumed; be wasted.
She hates to see good food go to waste.
-
lay waste, to devastate; destroy; ruin.
Forest fires lay waste thousands of acres yearly.
verb
-
(tr) to use, consume, or expend thoughtlessly, carelessly, or to no avail
-
(tr) to fail to take advantage of
to waste an opportunity
-
to lose or cause to lose bodily strength, health, etc
-
to exhaust or become exhausted
-
(tr) to ravage
-
informal (tr) to murder or kill
I want that guy wasted by tomorrow
noun
-
the act of wasting or state of being wasted
-
a failure to take advantage of something
-
anything unused or not used to full advantage
-
anything or anyone rejected as useless, worthless, or in excess of what is required
-
garbage, rubbish, or trash
-
a land or region that is devastated or ruined
-
a land or region that is wild or uncultivated
-
physiol
-
the useless products of metabolism
-
indigestible food residue
-
-
disintegrated rock material resulting from erosion
-
law reduction in the value of an estate caused by act or neglect, esp by a life-tenant
adjective
-
rejected as useless, unwanted, or worthless
-
produced in excess of what is required
-
not cultivated, inhabited, or productive
waste land
-
-
of or denoting the useless products of metabolism
-
of or denoting indigestible food residue
-
-
destroyed, devastated, or ruined
-
designed to contain or convey waste products
-
to devastate or destroy
-
An unusable or unwanted substance or material, such as a waste product.
-
See also hazardous waste landfill
Synonym Usage
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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wastesimple
-
wastessimple
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have wastedperfect
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has wastedperfect
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am wastingprogressive
-
are wastingprogressive
-
is wastingprogressive
-
have been wastingperfect progressive
-
has been wastingperfect progressive
Past
-
wastedsimple
-
had wastedperfect
-
was wastingprogressive
-
were wastingprogressive
-
had been wastingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of waste
First recorded in 1150–1200; 1960–65 waste for def. 6; (for the adjective) Middle English, from Old North French wast (compare Old French g(u)ast ), from Latin vāstus “desolate, destroyed, empty, immense”; verb and noun derivative of the adjective; cf. vast ( def. )
Explanation
If waste is useless, then to waste is to fritter away. Don't waste time putting your waste paper in the waste basket, just chuck it in the recycling bin. As a noun, waste, meaning “desolate regions” stems from the Old English westen, meaning “a desert, wilderness.” Later, it came to imply a “useless activity,” and even later than that, “refuse matter,” or “trash.” As a verb, waste “devastate, ruin,” comes from the Latin vastare, “to lay waste.” It later adopted the sense of “spend or consume uselessly.” It can also mean “to kill.” The poet E. E. Cummings said, “The most wasted of all days is one without laughter.”
Vocabulary lists containing waste
Common Five-letter Words for Wordle, List 4
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Natural Resources and the Environment - Introductory
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Earth Science - Middle School
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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:
International relations expert Kingsley Makhubela said it would be a "waste of time" for South Africa to appeal its removal.
From Barron's ● Nov. 3, 2026
Motivations include saving money, giving items to charity and disgust at how often perfectly usable items are being consigned to waste - or a combination of all three.
From BBC ● Nov. 3, 2026
“Don’t waste the income valley. Your income and tax rate will be lower than it’s been in decades. Think about distribution planning, drawing down an IRA,” Taylor said.
From MarketWatch ● Nov. 2, 2026
For Morrison, left to search for his partner amid the snow, hazardous ridges and cliffs, it all seems like a waste.
From Salon ● Nov. 1, 2026
“We’ll go straight to Mr. Pinkerton’s office. He’ll have the costume there. We can’t waste a minute!”
From "The Detective's Assistant" by Kate Hannigan
But the Independent was cooler on the launch episode as a whole, saying the show "wastes Nigella's prodigious charms and misses chance for a true revamp".
From BBC ● Sep. 23, 2026
It just wastes the strategy — and your money.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 14, 2026
It does point out that “very little is known about the history of this deep-ocean disposal, the nature of the wastes, or waste sources.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 15, 2026
Once she’s plugged in, charged and becomes sentient like the rest of the toys in Bonnie’s room, Lily wastes no time shaking things up.
From Salon ● Jun. 21, 2026
And every week we waste, more of my lung function wastes away too.
From "Five Feet Apart" by Rachael Lippincott
When Manning joined the Denver Broncos in 2012, he wasted little time establishing roots in Colorado.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 22, 2026
Another research paper found that small doctors’ practices in the U.S. spent — or wasted — nearly four times as much dealing with insurers as they do in Canada, with a single-payer system.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 21, 2026
Whitelaw encouraged people to play their part by reducing the amount of food they wasted at home.
From BBC ● Oct. 18, 2026
If it disappoints, much of that $9 trillion will have been wasted.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 18, 2026
I had not wasted the talents and opportunities God gave me, and I’d tried to be, as my mom put it, the best Simone I could be.
From "Courage to Soar" by Simone Biles
Even more strikingly, restoring cardiolipin to approximately two-thirds of its normal concentration began reversing muscle wasting and completely prevented the premature deaths seen in the affected animals.
From Science Daily ● Oct. 28, 2026
Its scenes are remote, fragmentary and, like the melancholic king, perversely “expert in wasting everyone’s time.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 16, 2026
People who received the fabricated pictures believed there was an intruder in their home and called 911 in a panic, wasting police resources, according to the department.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 1, 2026
During that time Kevin Pietersen, now an England mentor, said Banton "has all the talent but, at the moment, he is wasting it".
From BBC ● Sep. 27, 2026
“You’re just wasting money paying all these scammers,” Grandma insists.
From "Split the Sky" by Marie Arnold
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