devour
Americanverb (used with object)
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devours,
present (3rd person singular)
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devoured,
past participle, past
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devouring
present participle
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to swallow or eat up hungrily, voraciously, or ravenously.
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to consume destructively, recklessly, or wantonly.
Fire devoured the old museum.
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to engulf or swallow up.
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to take in greedily with the senses or intellect.
to devour the works of Freud.
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to absorb or engross wholly.
a mind devoured by fears.
verb
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to swallow or eat up greedily or voraciously
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to waste or destroy; consume
the flames devoured the curtains
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to consume greedily or avidly with the senses or mind
he devoured the manuscripts
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to engulf or absorb
the flood devoured the land
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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devourernoun
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devouringnessnoun
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interdevourverb (used with object)
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predevourverb (used with object)
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redevourverb (used with object)
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devouringadjective
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self-devouringadjective
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undevouredadjective
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devouringlyadverb
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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devoursimple
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devourssimple
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have devouredperfect
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has devouredperfect
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am devouringprogressive
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are devouringprogressive
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is devouringprogressive
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have been devouringperfect progressive
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has been devouringperfect progressive
Past
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devouredsimple
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had devouredperfect
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was devouringprogressive
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were devouringprogressive
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had been devouringperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of devour
First recorded in 1275–1325; Middle English devouren, from Anglo-French, Old French devourer, from Latin dēvorāre “to swallow down,” from dē- de- + vorāre “to eat up”
Explanation
When you've gone all day without eating anything, you'll probably devour your dinner, especially if it's your very favorite homemade lasagna. Devour means to eat greedily and hungrily. The meaning of devour has grown to include the consumption of things other than food. If you sit down to start a book and look up ten hours later having turned the last page, you have devoured that book. If your after school job devours all your free time, chances are your grades are going to drop. The Latin root, devorare, means "to swallow down."
Vocabulary lists containing devour
Eat Your Words
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"To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee, Chapters 7–11
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Unit 1: Telling Details
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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:
I still devour new music this way, clocking a daily average of four hours of tunes familiar and novel.
From Salon ● Oct. 4, 2026
One court warned that public nuisance would become “a monster that would devour in one gulp the entire law of tort.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 19, 2026
For him and his family, this is a rare chance to devour durians "of good quality, and sometimes at nearly half the price of previous seasons".
From BBC ● Jun. 29, 2026
The group stage would be a series of blowouts, the sharks would devour the minnows.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 28, 2026
“Thief,” Jon said, as the I bird flapped up to the lintel above the door to devour its prize.
From "A Dance with Dragons" by George R. R. Martin
"If you don't run from it and you try to face it, it devours you," Ecologio Cabrera, 86, told AFP after fleeing with nothing.
From Barron's ● Jul. 25, 2026
That hot, hard rock devours conventional drill bits and makes a hash of the concrete usually poured deep underground around the steel pipes required to line such a well and keep it from collapsing.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 23, 2025
In the show, rare glimpses of his inner turmoil come when he devours a lemon tart or a chocolate bar with a pleasureless intensity.
From New York Times ● Jun. 6, 2024
He doesn’t run so much as he devours real estate in huge chunks.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 24, 2024
Hunger devours me, I could almost weep for something to eat, I cannot struggle against it.
From "All Quiet on the Western Front: A Novel" by Erich Maria Remarque
His articles in the Red Star were devoured by tens of millions of readers.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 10, 2026
He played football for his school team, devoured Harry Potter and Percy Jackson novels, loved science-fiction films and spent hours teaching himself hard-rock guitar riffs.
From BBC ● Aug. 2, 2026
Pre-IPO allocations have been devoured by wealthy investors, and post-IPO trading is expected to be truly avaricious.
From Barron's ● Jun. 10, 2026
"Books devoured me, they ate me," she said.
From BBC ● May 29, 2026
Pita started to speak, but fear devoured her voice and she didn’t finish her sentence.
From "Summer of the Mariposas" by Guadalupe García McCall
Scavenger animals such as possums, red foxes and crows can be exposed to the virus while devouring the carcasses of infected birds.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 24, 2026
The beds and food bowls are gone; the floor where they always left messes after devouring the grub I made them is eerily clean.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 28, 2026
Strong winds and a tinder-dry landscape meant that the fire advanced at frightening speed, devouring large amounts of territory in very little time.
From Barron's ● Jul. 22, 2026
It’s only people like Ruth, who thanklessly work to allay that suffering even in the smallest ways, that keep the darkness from devouring us whole.
From Salon ● Jun. 18, 2026
I barely have time to pull my hand away before Nate hops off the bench and starts devouring my cold fries.
From "Dragons in a Bag" by Zetta Elliott
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Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
