gripe
Americanverb (used without object)
verb (used with object)
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Informal. to annoy or irritate.
His tone of voice gripes me.
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to produce pain in (the bowels) as if by constriction.
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to distress, afflict, or oppress.
poverty that gripes and pinches us.
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Nautical. to secure (a lifeboat) to a deck or against a pudding boom on davits.
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Archaic.
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to seize and hold firmly with the hand, claws, etc.; grasp; clutch.
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to greedily take possession of and hold tightly.
The miser gripes his money for fear of losing it.
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noun
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Informal. a nagging complaint.
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Pathology. Usually gripes. an intermittent spasmodic pain in the bowels.
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something that grips or clutches; a claw or grip.
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Nautical.
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a lashing or chain by which a boat is secured to a deck or in position on davits.
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Also called gripe piece. a curved timber connecting the stem or cutwater of a wooden hull with the keel.
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the exterior angle or curve formed by this piece; forefoot.
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the forward end of the dished keel of a metal hull.
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Archaic.
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the act of gripping, grasping, or clutching.
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a firm hold; clutch.
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mastery; hold; control.
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Rare. a handle, hilt, etc.
verb
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informal (intr) to complain, esp in a persistent nagging manner
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to cause sudden intense pain in the intestines of (a person) or (of a person) to experience this pain
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(intr) nautical (of a ship) to tend to come up into the wind in spite of the helm
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archaic to clutch; grasp
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archaic (tr) to afflict
noun
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(usually plural) a sudden intense pain in the intestines; colic
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informal a complaint or grievance
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rare
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the act of gripping
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a firm grip
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a device that grips
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(in plural) nautical the lashings that secure a boat
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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gripesimple
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gripessimple
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have gripedperfect
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has gripedperfect
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am gripingprogressive
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are gripingprogressive
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is gripingprogressive
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have been gripingperfect progressive
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has been gripingperfect progressive
Past
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gripedsimple
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had gripedperfect
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was gripingprogressive
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were gripingprogressive
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had been gripingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of gripe
First recorded in 1350–1400; Middle English gripen, Old English grīpan; cognate with Dutch grijpen, German griefen; see grip, grope
Explanation
The word gripe, as both noun and verb, refers to a minor complaint. Why gripe about the size of the portions when the food is so awful? The key to gripe is that as complaints go, it's trivial. You don't gripe about your house burning down or the cost of medical care. You gripe about your friend's status updates and the fact the Yankees have too much money. A gripe can last a while. For example, the city has been hearing gripes about parking rules for a generation, but as complaints go, it's just not getting a lot of traction. One person's gripe, however, can be another person's major headache. It all depends on your point of view.
Vocabulary lists containing gripe
The Vocabulary.com Top 1000
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Curmudgeon, Cantankerous and Churlish: Grouchy Words
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Out of the Dust
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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:
Surveys of doctors and patients have shown that the insurers’ validation process is a top gripe.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 5, 2026
While I didn’t encounter any issues when contacting ExpressVPN’s support department, the biggest gripe regarding the negatives is just that.
From Salon ● Mar. 27, 2026
Yet back-to-back red cards against Burnley and Arsenal followed, Chelsea continue to be outrun in the Premier League, and lapses in concentration have become a weekly gripe from the 41-year-old.
From BBC ● Mar. 23, 2026
Residents in many parts of the Midwest have fewer reasons to gripe.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jan. 3, 2026
And this is the primary gripe she has with me—she’s even said as much, despite her list—but with us it’s ever urgent, the big one.
From "Native Speaker" by Chang-rae Lee
Though his wife and I had been in the same women’s book group, I’d known Eric only through the wry gripes we’d all made about our husbands.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 17, 2026
Eleven years into their relationship, Waidelich has her gripes with the felines: The fur is everywhere, “the litter box is disgusting,” she said.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 6, 2026
It’s a “three-ring circus”: the merits docket, the shadow docket, and the justices’ increasingly public intramural snipings and gripes.
From Slate ● May 30, 2026
This was an increase from just over 70,000 in 2020-21, with one of the main gripes about poor response times.
From BBC ● May 14, 2026
He didn’t have too many gripes about them— as parents went, they were pretty decent.
From "Found" by Margaret Peterson Haddix
Some traders had griped that such markets were a sucker’s game because the shows are usually recorded before a studio audience several hours before airtime.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 24, 2026
In perhaps the weirdest admission, Katie Miller griped that her husband wears shoes in the house against her will, which she dislikes because “the kids eat off the floor.”
From Salon ● Feb. 16, 2026
“The system here is broken on many levels,” she griped in a statement.
From Slate ● Sep. 4, 2025
“In America, art is always paid for by somebody and griped about by somebody else,” Klaus opines late in the novel to Di.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 6, 2025
They married and returned to his island home where there wasn't anything to do—Doña Charito griped in her gutturals—but get one's work done.
From "How the García Girls Lost Their Accents" by Julia Alvarez
The 56-year-old native of upstate New York left his first term on the board prematurely in 2011, griping over policy differences.
From Barron's ● May 12, 2026
There was much intra-Senate grousing and griping and bickering in the days preceding Friday morning’s vote.
From Slate ● Mar. 28, 2026
Vassiliadis, who became a close friend, described Ralenkotter as a traditionalist: good family man, devout Catholic, not a gambler himself; even in their last conversation, Vassiliadis noted, Ralenkotter was still griping about baseball’s designated-hitter rule.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 30, 2025
Sweeney has been the subject of online griping since her American Eagle campaign debuted.
From Salon ● Aug. 3, 2025
Jonah knew that they were almost at school, that the bus around them was filled with kids laughing and flirting and teasing and griping and even—here and there—singing.
From "Found" by Margaret Peterson Haddix
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.
