hex
verb (used with object)
to bewitch; practice witchcraft on.
hex
1 American
[heks]
/ hɛks /
verb (used with object)
-
hexes,
present (3rd person singular)
-
hexed,
past participle, past
-
hexing
present participle
noun
-
hexes
plural
-
spell; charm.
With all this rain, somebody must have put a hex on our picnic.
-
a witch.
hex
2
American
[heks]
/ hɛks /
hex.
3
American
abbreviation
-
hexagon
-
hexagonal.
hex
1
British
/ hɛks /
noun
hex
2
British
/ hɛks /
verb
noun
-
an evil spell or symbol of bad luck
-
a witch
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
hexsimple
-
hexessimple
-
have hexedperfect
-
has hexedperfect
-
am hexingprogressive
-
are hexingprogressive
-
is hexingprogressive
-
have been hexingperfect progressive
-
has been hexingperfect progressive
Past
-
hexedsimple
-
had hexedperfect
-
was hexingprogressive
-
were hexingprogressive
-
had been hexingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of hex1
1820–30; < German Hexe witch; see hag 1
Origin of hex2
First recorded in 1920–25; by shortening
Explanation
A hex is a magic spell or charm that's meant to cause harm. A witch in a story, for example, might put a hex on a prince that turns him into a chicken. If you believe in magic, you might either fear hexes or aspire to learn how to put them on your enemies — to hex them. In the Pennsylvania Dutch tradition, "hex signs," forms of stars, flowers, and circles, are commonly painted on barns. Though tourists often interpret these as having superstitious meanings, they're really just folk art symbols. The Middle High German root of hex is Hexe, or "witch."
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:
Now a coolheaded town is rationally panicking that the Presidential visit has put a hex on a team that couldn’t lose.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 9, 2026
Like the store’s sign, the sky glowed Big Orange, hex code #F96302, or Pantone 165 C, available in the paint department inside.
From Slate ● Jan. 27, 2026
While the agony was prolonged, you can't imagine a player of Swiatek's quality will suffer a career-spanning hex.
From BBC ● Apr. 21, 2025
People blowing up my phone like, “Man, it’s not fair. He gets 17 games,” or, “We’re going to put a hex on him.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 26, 2024
He, Ron, and Hermione were on their feet, all three of them having used a different hex.
From "Harry Potter And The Goblet Of Fire" by J. K. Rowling
She then carries her grief through “Desierto,” a banda ballad that hexes a past love to an eternity of dreary karmic payback.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 14, 2024
But a tiny subset of people also develop less common symptoms, ones that can sound like hexes from a children’s story: hairy tongues, purple toes, welts that sprout on their faces.
From Seattle Times ● Nov. 17, 2022
It was difficult to prove beyond the shadow of a doubt something as ephemeral as the bewitching of a cow or any of the other supposed hexes Parsons had been accused of.
From Slate ● Oct. 31, 2022
In the comics, Wanda’s powers allow her to control probability via her hexes — the same word for her powers is also the shape of the fictional city she’s made for herself, yes.
From The Verge ● Feb. 26, 2021
“Because rootwork takes intent. And all I’m intending to do is make myself a drink, not throw hexes or fix somebody’s condition.”
From "Root Magic" by Eden Royce
She publicly hexed murderers and rapists, wrote 13 books on ritual and witchcraft and founded the long-running International Goddess Festival — a biannual gathering of women in the California redwoods that continues to this day.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 18, 2021
Can he beat Kershaw, the hexed man of October, if they meet in Game 2 on Thursday?
From Washington Post ● Sep. 29, 2020
And so I started to ask around: What should parents do about kindergarten, and only kindergarten, in this hexed year?
From Slate ● Aug. 5, 2020
During three seasons at his new post, Silverman would do the unthinkable: unseat CBS and raise the perennially hexed ABC to unprecedented victory with shows like “Charlie’s Angels,” ”The Love Boat” and the miniseries “Roots.”
From Washington Times ● Sep. 14, 2015
Once they had found out, they had been hexed with forbidden magic in order to go along with the Uncles’ schemes when they did not want to.
From "Witchlings" by Claribel A. Ortega
David Cameron, I suspect, merely wants to halt allegations of him "hexing" the team with his actual physical presence.
From The Guardian ● Aug. 10, 2012
Anyway, I'd appreciate it if you stop hexing me.
From Golf Digest ● Apr. 19, 2011
Crosby was so superstitious about hexing his Pirates that he and Kathryn listened to the game with their friends Charles and Nonie de Limur in Paris.
From New York Times ● Sep. 23, 2010
But trust me, all my friends who think it is ridiculous, in the last year, they have begged me to use my powers of hexing.
From Time ● Nov. 29, 2
“There’s no point hexing me,” squealed the sprite, “there’s the elf you want right there.”
From "Artemis Fowl" by Eoin Colfer
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.
