encase
Americanverb (used with object)
-
encases,
present (3rd person singular)
-
encased,
past participle, past
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encasing
present participle
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
encasesimple
-
encasessimple
-
have encasedperfect
-
has encasedperfect
-
am encasingprogressive
-
are encasingprogressive
-
is encasingprogressive
-
have been encasingperfect progressive
-
has been encasingperfect progressive
Past
-
encasedsimple
-
had encasedperfect
-
was encasingprogressive
-
were encasingprogressive
-
had been encasingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of encase
Explanation
To encase something is to cover it or close it off, as if you were putting it in a shell, a coating, or a box. Some cheesemakers encase each wheel of cheese in wax. When you're packing your lunch, you might encase a brownie in wax paper, or encase a sandwich in a plastic container. A hug can encase you in warmth and affection, and the dark can even seem to encase you on a moonless night in the country. Encase combines the prefix en-, "make" or "put in," and case, "container" or "receptacle," from the Latin root capsa, "box."
Vocabulary lists containing encase
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:
Steel ribs encase the viewer, giving one the feeling of being in an upturned ship, as a soundtrack that ranges from gospel singing to mechanical clicks plays in the background.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 17, 2025
She thought perhaps she could keep them, encase them in a necklace to wear in memory.
From Salon ● Sep. 14, 2025
However, the quantum noise that lurks inside the vacuum tubes that encase LIGO's laser beams can alter the timing of the photons in the beams by minutely small amounts.
From Science Daily ● Oct. 23, 2023
As The Times reported in May on the growing number of assaults against Metro bus drivers, the agency is attempting to curtail such incidents by installing floor-to-ceiling plastic walls that fully encase the driver.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 22, 2023
The teeth of a skate or dogfish cover the roof and floor of its mouth and pass at the lip into the flattened toothlike scales that encase most of its body.
From A Short History of the World by H. G. (Herbert George) Wells
“Midnight Movement” encases Monk’s best-known melody, “’Round Midnight” within a chiming, repeated figure and a gauze of natural overtones and synth tones.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 19, 2026
The operation's name - "matryoshkas" are Russian nesting dolls - mirrors its method, which encases an original false claim in layers of ambient re-posts from old or hacked social media accounts.
From BBC ● Feb. 27, 2026
Most quantum computers include a component casually referred to as a “fridge,” a cryogenic enclosure that encases the processor and keeps it cold.
From Barron's ● Jan. 6, 2026
But there is no denying that even his forays into décor — such as a commercially produced, now-popular coffee table that encases pounds of blue powder inside a plexiglass box — emit a celestial flavor.
From New York Times ● May 16, 2024
Four cables, attached to tracks on the buildings, break through the stones, dragging up the net that encases Mitchell.
From "Mockingjay" by Suzanne Collins
Keurig is rolling out a line of single-serve coffee rounds made of compressed grounds encased in a seaweed-based coating.
From Barron's ● Oct. 10, 2026
Before Gary Oldman’s Dracula became a pale, bewigged count, he was Vlad the Impaler, encased in one of the most striking costumes in Francis Ford Coppola’s 1992 “Bram Stoker’s Dracula.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 25, 2026
I have, it turns out, a thing for sausage encased in dough.
From Salon ● Sep. 7, 2026
Azure’s results are encased somewhere in those numbers.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 26, 2026
Five were still encased in dark red pulp.
From "The Mark of Athena" by Rick Riordan
Bulletproof glass encasing the portico for his annual appearance with the Easter Bunny?
From Slate ● Apr. 28, 2026
This mammoth died nearby, but his carcass slumped into an ancient stream bed and was covered by sediment and eventually topped by the pits’ oozing asphalt, encasing and preserving his bones.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 22, 2026
This story has been updated to correct the name of the Denver exhibit that is chipping away at the rock encasing the T. rex fossil.
From Seattle Times ● Jun. 3, 2024
The moat of trash in the yard reaches the driveway, encasing a red Toyota Corolla Twin Cam in crumpled tarps, coat hangers, broom handles, coffee cups, more newspaper and more plastic bags.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 3, 2024
I feel fur, inside and out, encasing me.
From "Catching Fire" by Suzanne Collins
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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.
