furnace
Americannoun
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furnaces
plural
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a structure or apparatus in which heat may be generated, as for heating houses, smelting ores, or producing steam.
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a place characterized by intense heat.
The volcano was a seething furnace.
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Astronomy. Furnace, the constellation Fornax.
verb (used with object)
noun
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an enclosed chamber in which heat is produced to generate steam, destroy refuse, smelt or refine ores, etc
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a very hot or stifling place
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of furnace
First recorded in 1175–1225; Middle English furneis, furnais, from Old French fornais, fournais, from Latin fornāc- (stem of fornāx “kiln, oven”), akin to formus “warm”
Explanation
A furnace is an appliance that heats houses and buildings by burning fuel or circulating hot water. Your furnace might rumble in the basement, sending heat up through your house's radiators. Most houses in cold climates have a furnace, to warm their rooms during the chilly months of the year. Furnaces also have industrial uses, like burning trash or extracting ore from metal. If someone says, "It's as hot as a furnace in this classroom!" they mean that it's extremely hot. Furnace comes from the Old French fornaise, "oven," with the Latin root word fornacem, "oven or kiln."
Vocabulary lists containing furnace
Mockingbird
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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:
“That gives us the ability to produce the highest quality steel that electric arc furnace producers have not been able to produce,” he said.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 12, 2026
My house will eventually need a new roof and probably a new furnace.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 8, 2026
Seiler placed them in a semi-sealed steel container with very little oxygen and heated them in a high-temperature furnace in his home laboratory.
From Science Daily ● Sep. 26, 2026
"Every stage is crucial," explains master cymbalsmith Hasan Seker, a burly 56-year-old who co-founded Bosphorus Cymbals in 1996 and is sweating after hauling glowing blanks into and out of the furnace.
From Barron's ● Aug. 6, 2026
Dad takes in a heaping forkful of squash and chews it like a furnace.
From "It’s Kind of a Funny Story" by Ned Vizzini
In April last year, the government passed an emergency bill to take control of British Steel amid reports the then-owner Jingye was planning to switch off two blast furnaces in Scunthorpe.
From BBC ● Sep. 18, 2026
At 19, Pierpaolo Seguso created his first glasswork in the furnaces of his family’s glassblowing factory: an elaborate vase he named “Isola.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 17, 2026
While saying there was no major impact yet on its blast furnaces, finance chief Axel Hamann said the company was keeping a close eye on the situation.
From Barron's ● Aug. 13, 2026
In April 2025, Britain’s Parliament was recalled on a Saturday to stop the Chinese owner of its last two blast furnaces from letting them go cold.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 13, 2026
Mark McClellan worked his way up from the Kaiser furnaces to management.
From "Class Matters" by The New York Times
Every word that he speaks has been fierily furnaced In the blast of a life that has struggled in earnest.
From Home Life of Great Authors by Hattie Tyng Griswold
Across a tract of furnaced flints there came a wind of water, From yellow banks with tender hints of Tethys' white-armed daughter.
From The Poems of Henry Kendall With Biographical Note by Bertram Stevens by Henry Kendall
Bake yourselves, kiln-dry yourselves, if you choose, in your furnaced houses at home, but, if you value your health, "reform that altogether" in Italy.
From The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 05, No. 31, May, 1860 by Various
There he lies and sleeps From year to year—in soft Australian nights, And through the furnaced noons, and in the times Of wind and wet!
From The Poems of Henry Kendall With Biographical Note by Bertram Stevens by Henry Kendall
And the winds blew with excessive heat, as if warmed by the breath of sighs furnaced forth by travellers grieved at being separated from their wives.
From Tales of the Sun or Folklore of Southern India by Mrs. Howard Kingscote
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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.
