hive
Americannoun
verb (used with object)
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to gather into or cause to enter a hive.
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to shelter as in a hive.
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to store up in a hive.
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to store or lay away for future use or enjoyment.
verb (used without object)
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(of bees) to enter a hive.
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to live together in or as in a hive.
verb phrase
noun
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a structure in which social bees live and rear their young
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a colony of social bees
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a place showing signs of great industry (esp in the phrase a hive of activity )
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a teeming crowd; multitude
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an object in the form of a hive
verb
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to cause (bees) to collect or (of bees) to collect inside a hive
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to live or cause to live in or as if in a hive
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(tr) (of bees) to store (honey, pollen, etc) in the hive
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(tr; often foll by up or away) to store, esp for future use
he used to hive away a small sum every week
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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hivesimple
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hivessimple
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have hivedperfect
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has hivedperfect
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am hivingprogressive
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are hivingprogressive
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is hivingprogressive
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have been hivingperfect progressive
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has been hivingperfect progressive
Past
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hivedsimple
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had hivedperfect
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was hivingprogressive
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were hivingprogressive
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had been hivingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of hive
First recorded before 900; Middle English; Old English hȳf; akin to Old Norse hūfr “ship's hull,” Latin cūpa “vat”
Explanation
A hive can be a home for bees. It’s also a whole bunch of something moving around — like a hive of eager students — which is related to the fact that so many bees live in a hive. The word hive is most recognizable as a place where bees live, but it can be a verb that means to move together as one, like a swarm of bees. It can also describe storing a lot of things in a confined space, the way bees are packed into a hive. You might hive your stamp collection in boxes in the attic, but if bees have built a hive in the eaves you won't be able to get to them.
Vocabulary lists containing hive
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:
"It will be a buzzing hive of royal activity in every other way".
From BBC ● Jun. 25, 2026
The study area included hedges, a cornfield, and a tree that stood between the hive and the food source, preventing a direct route.
From Science Daily ● Jun. 14, 2026
Once a hotbed of post-coup protests, it has since thrived as a nightlife hive.
From Barron's ● Jun. 12, 2026
David Mills keeps a hive of bees on his property near Seattle that he calls the “spicy girls.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 5, 2026
She flung the frame of bees as far from her as she could, then ran forward, reaching out both arms, to catch Ess before the girl could hit the hive.
From "Orphan Island" by Laurel Snyder
The most common symptoms are hives and gastrointestinal issues, but symptoms can progress to shortness of breath and even anaphylactic shock.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 25, 2026
“The bees were in that field,” Teller said, “and once the fire passed through, we tried to save whatever hives we could that weren’t on fire.”
From Los Angeles Times ● May 29, 2026
According to the researchers, that is comparable to more than 200 honeybee hives and exceeds Manhattan's human population by more than threefold.
From Science Daily ● May 28, 2026
This club of apiarists -- ranging from hobbyists to full-time commercial bee farmers -- gathers regularly to learn new skills and discuss tricky problems, not least the parasitic varroa mites that plague their hives.
From Barron's ● May 19, 2026
Because if I ever get a rare disease that causes my butt to break out in fluorescent hives or something totally rando like that, I know Maddie’s the only one who could save me.
From "From Twinkle, with Love" by Sandhya Menon
He hived off the employee from the investigation, but the discovery underlined the stakes.
From Washington Post ● Sep. 20, 2022
The company owns a large stake in Russian energy giant Rosneft, but within days it had announced the operation would be hived off.
From BBC ● Mar. 2, 2022
These were done using routine commercially available lab equipment, or were hived off to other facilities.
From Nature ● May 13, 2018
The Sun is an underdog too, a loss-making has-been hived off by its parent company to make way for the all-conquering Daily Mirror.
From Economist ● Jul. 6, 2017
As evening moved into night, they ate through me and hived up inside my brainpan with a loud buzz, their wings beating me into submission.
From "Chains" by Laurie Halse Anderson
Dr Jash says he also told her that they may even have to perform an invasive surgery which would involve hiving off a part of her lung.
From BBC ● Apr. 26, 2024
Men spilled over each other, hiving off into small groups to drink.
From Seattle Times ● Apr. 11, 2024
Volkswagen said it was considering hiving off its profitable Porsche division into a separate company with its own stock listing.
From New York Times ● Feb. 22, 2022
At that time, Tata Steel had only planned to combine its Dutch assets with ThyssenKrupp’s steel assetsin Germany while hiving off its ailing U.K. business to other parties.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 11, 2016
I often have them begin to cluster near the ground, very conveniently for hiving.
From Mysteries of Bee-keeping Explained by Quinby, M. (Moses)
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.
