halve
Americanverb (used with object)
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halves,
present (3rd person singular)
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halved,
past participle, past
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halving
present participle
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to divide into two equal parts.
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to share equally.
to halve one's rations with a stranger.
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to reduce to half.
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Golf. to play (a hole, round, or match) in the same number of strokes as one's opponent.
idioms
verb
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to divide into two approximately equal parts
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to share equally
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to reduce by half, as by cutting
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golf to take the same number of strokes on (a hole or round) as one's opponent
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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halvesimple
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halvessimple
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have halvedperfect
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has halvedperfect
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am halvingprogressive
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are halvingprogressive
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is halvingprogressive
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have been halvingperfect progressive
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has been halvingperfect progressive
Past
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halvedsimple
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had halvedperfect
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was halvingprogressive
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were halvingprogressive
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had been halvingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of halve
1250–1300; Middle English halven, derivative of half
Explanation
To halve something is to divide it into two equal parts. When you share a pizza with your best friend, you can cut it in half, or halve it. A recipe might instruct you to halve an onion, and a little kid might request that you halve her peanut butter sandwich and cut the crusts off. You can also halve less physical things — you can halve your expenses if you reduce them by half, or halve the bill for lunch with your sister, if you split it with her. Halve comes from half, originally an Old English word meaning "side" or "part."
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:
The government is also planning to "almost halve" its social security deficit in 2027, bringing it down to 12 to 13 billion euros, Labour Minister Jean-Pierre Farandou said.
From Barron's ● Oct. 1, 2026
Labour promised in its 2024 manifesto to halve violence against women and girls within a decade.
From BBC ● Sep. 20, 2026
Volkswagen’s supervisory board this month approved a plan to cut 100,000 jobs and halve its model portfolio, in part due to the strain of increasing competition.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 18, 2026
Blume and his team want to halve the number of models—still leaving Volkswagen with many more than peers, they say—and make sure those that survive better match the tastes of consumers in different markets.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 2, 2026
Just when I think I’m getting the hang of something, Asher will halve the time required of us to do certain missions or perform certain moves.
From "Warcross" by Marie Lu
A patio divides the two halves, providing access to the outdoors and opportunities to bring more light into both wings of the house.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 6, 2026
“You could have folded a picture of them, and the two halves would’ve matched,” Herzog writes.
From Salon ● Sep. 28, 2026
A few minutes after liftoff, its two halves will separate and fall away, allowing Roman to continue its journey into space.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 26, 2026
"You don't really have too many halves of a cricket ball, so it would be something that we never forget."
From BBC ● Aug. 19, 2026
He rummaged in the pouch hung around his neck, and pulled out the two halves of holly still just connected by the finest thread of phoenix feather.
From "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows" by J.K. Rowling
However, it said the "stark reality" was that UK cask ale volumes had more than halved in less than a decade and "this trend looks set to continue across the UK".
From BBC ● Oct. 8, 2026
The Institute for Fiscal Studies thinktank says that, had Burnham's tweak been in place since 2011, it would have more than halved the annual £16bn cost of the triple lock, a £9bn saving every year.
From BBC ● Sep. 29, 2026
CE estimates China’s export volumes of solar panels, EVs and lithium-ion batteries, where EU counts as a key consumer, have tripled—while prices have roughly halved since 2022.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 23, 2026
A report by the Deutsche Bank Research Institute published in July found that the yen’s purchasing power had halved since 2012, making Japan an outlier in terms of the cheapness of its currency.
From MarketWatch ● Sep. 8, 2026
It looked like a giant halved melon with the round side out.
From "A Tree Grows in Brooklyn" by Betty Smith
UPS launched a “pretty big transformation of our company” that involved halving Amazon’s volume, she said.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 6, 2026
Microsoft asserted that the new chip is 1,000 times more reliable than its predecessor, effectively halving the timeline to build a scalable quantum computer.
From Barron's ● Jun. 3, 2026
Brazilian exports to the US fell off a cliff, more than halving last summer.
From BBC ● May 28, 2026
In the last cycle Micron stock peaked at the start of 2022, with the forward P/E at just nine times, ahead of a halving in the shares that year.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 17, 2026
And it is also at this point that he would have made an unfortunate discovery: looking at his image in a mirror will have had the effect of halving its height.
From "The Invention of Science" by David Wootton
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.
