hunger
Americannoun
verb (used without object)
-
hungers,
present (3rd person singular)
-
hungered,
past participle, past
-
hungering
present participle
-
to feel hunger; be hungry.
-
to have a strong desire.
verb (used with object)
-
hungers,
present (3rd person singular)
-
hungered,
past participle, past
-
hungering
present participle
idioms
noun
-
a feeling of pain, emptiness, or weakness induced by lack of food
-
an appetite, desire, need, or craving
hunger for a woman
verb
-
to have or cause to have a need or craving for food
-
(intr; usually foll by for or after) to have a great appetite or desire (for)
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
hungersimple
-
hungerssimple
-
have hungeredperfect
-
has hungeredperfect
-
am hungeringprogressive
-
are hungeringprogressive
-
is hungeringprogressive
-
have been hungeringperfect progressive
-
has been hungeringperfect progressive
Past
-
hungeredsimple
-
had hungeredperfect
-
was hungeringprogressive
-
were hungeringprogressive
-
had been hungeringperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of hunger
First recorded before 900; Middle English; Old English hungor; cognate with German Hunger
Explanation
Hunger is the sensation of needing — or wanting — to eat something. People use the same word to describe a hankering for a snack or for the more dire meaning of starvation, as in "world hunger." Hunger sometimes refers to an extreme lack of food, the equivalent to starvation: "We need to do something about hunger in poor communities." It can also simply mean your afternoon craving: "My daily hunger for chocolate was distracting me from my work." You can also hunger for things, both food (like when you hunger for French fries) and non-food things (like when you hunger for attention).
Vocabulary lists containing hunger
Nutrition - Introductory
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Nutrition - Middle School
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Nutrition - High School
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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:
“As long as capex continues to ramp, I’d expect a hunger for more financing,” Argus Research analyst Joseph Bonner told MarketWatch, referring to capital expenditures, or corporate spending on property, plants and equipment.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 29, 2026
Panahi filmed the Palme d’Or-winning “It Was Just an Accident” clandestinely in Iran following his release from a seven-month stint in prison in 2023 after he declared a hunger strike.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 29, 2026
It estimates that 19.5 million people or 41% of Sudan's population are experiencing high levels of acute food insecurity, including five million facing emergency levels of hunger.
From BBC ● Oct. 27, 2026
In his third term he has overseen a drop in inflation and unemployment, and lifted millions out of hunger, but voters complain about a high cost of living and are fed up with crime.
From Barron's ● Oct. 25, 2026
When I give up on sleep and emerge from my room, it’s with hunger pangs in my stomach.
From "The Brightwood Code" by Monica Hesse
Huge questions for a party that used to dominate Scottish politics and hungers for a way back to power at Holyrood.
From BBC ● Jul. 22, 2026
No one hungers for the bad old days—the infamous “Ford to City: Drop Dead” headline ran just months before PS1 opened—but it’s hard not to be nostalgic for the art world of the past.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 22, 2026
Wong hungers for familiarity with her Chinese name, the memory of which has become so faint she calls upon her mother to repeat it to her.
From New York Times ● May 14, 2023
“Yet, our nation hungers for their radical song. Let us not sit back silently...”
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 25, 2023
To starve in order to learn about my environment was irrational, but so were my hungers.
From "Black Boy" by Richard Wright
Malcom McLean, a New Jersey commercial shipper who championed the new idea of prepacking cargo into big metal boxes, hungered for a Pentagon contract.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 29, 2026
Election administrators in many states have long hungered for better access to federal information on citizenship status.
From Salon ● Feb. 27, 2026
That added to a quasi “gold rush” among investors who understandably hungered for a piece of the action.
From MarketWatch ● Feb. 3, 2026
But while she hungered for education, academic strictures rarely suited her, and her methods, ahead of their time, struck many university gatekeepers as too unorthodox.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 17, 2023
And for thee I hungered and forsook my bed.
From "Good Masters! Sweet Ladies!: Voices from a Medieval Village" by Laura Amy Schlitz
Her own audience, primed to look for conspiracy theories in the wake of a high-profile murder, had been hungering for Owens to challenge the widely accepted version of events.
From Slate ● Feb. 27, 2026
It has also served as a watershed moment for the business-news landscape, making a group of internet influencers go-to sources for people hungering for news of FTX and SBF, as Bankman-Fried is known.
From Washington Post ● Jan. 5, 2023
“Our audiences are hungering for an authentic experience, the work of art placed in front of them,” Mr. Steward said.
From New York Times ● Oct. 20, 2022
Any hoops fan hungering for a return to normal this March might have looked at the bracket when it finally came out and wondered what ever changed.
From Seattle Times ● Mar. 13, 2022
He had awakened on this morning with a hungering need to bark out orders and have them carried out with speed and efficiency.
From "The Great Santini" by Pat Conroy
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Get a wordDefinitions 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.
