intertwine
Americanverb (used with or without object)
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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intertwinesimple
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intertwinessimple
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have intertwinedperfect
-
has intertwinedperfect
-
am intertwiningprogressive
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are intertwiningprogressive
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is intertwiningprogressive
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have been intertwiningperfect progressive
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has been intertwiningperfect progressive
Past
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intertwinedsimple
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had intertwinedperfect
-
was intertwiningprogressive
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were intertwiningprogressive
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had been intertwiningperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of intertwine
Explanation
Things that intertwine are twisted or mixed together. You have to intertwine yarn to make a scarf. When things intertwine, they're all mixed up together — it's hard to separate them. To make any type of clothing, threads have to be intertwined. Rope is made of smaller fibers that intertwine. Related jobs—like a writer and an editor—intertwine too, because they are so closely related. You can say people are intertwined if they're close to each other, as family or friends. Getting intertwined could be a metaphor for getting married; the threads of your lives are getting tangled together.
Vocabulary lists containing intertwine
The Distance Between Us
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The Sea of Monsters
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King and the Dragonflies
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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:
Romance, on the other hand, implies a unique feeling two people share, a spark that can be nurtured together as their lives intertwine.
From Salon ● Jun. 4, 2026
Mr. Hofstadter likes to intertwine a couple’s names as a wedding gift, for example, so that “Rachel” rotates into “Winston.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 21, 2025
The soul of the movie is in watching these ramrod opposites bend and intertwine.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 29, 2025
As she offers her prayers, the sacred space becomes a moment of spiritual release, where devotion and vulnerability intertwine.
From BBC ● Nov. 30, 2024
We intertwine our fingers and close our eyes against the sun.
From "We Were Liars" by E. Lockhart
U.S. regulators are now taking a closer look at the Wall Street playbook that effectively intertwines private credit with traditional life insurance.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 13, 2026
The deal further intertwines Musk's sprawling business empire, which already includes carmaker Tesla and social media platform X, formerly Twitter.
From Barron's ● Feb. 2, 2026
The New Yorker’s Grann intertwines the racism and injustices of 1920s Oklahoma, corruption of local authorities and the mysterious deaths of several Osage people, mostly women.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 14, 2025
"But now there's a very direct lineage between local teams, larger structures like the NFL Academy, leagues and how it all intertwines."
From BBC ● Dec. 28, 2024
Now to our eyes, made dim with years, Right intertwines with wrong.
From Many Voices by Nesbit, E. (Edith)
The lovers’ intertwined fates are made clear in an unsettling but whimsically life-affirming prologue that presents the moments of their births, one minute apart, in the same hospital.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 23, 2026
As for many parents here, grief has become intertwined with anger.
From BBC ● Jul. 23, 2026
Representatives from two local tribes draw a parallel between the gather and past efforts to expel their people from their ancestral lands, and say the horses are intertwined with their culture.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 30, 2026
The fortunes of these two groups are too tightly intertwined.
From MarketWatch ● Jun. 29, 2026
Holding to the trunk of a tree, he stole one last look at the small human whose destiny had been strangely intertwined with his own.
From "The Undead Fox of Deadwood Forest" by Aubrey Hartman
The themes of “Queen Esther” will be familiar to Mr. Irving’s many readers, who will also recognize his habit of intertwining fiction with personal history.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 7, 2025
The deal would signal a deeper "intertwining" of the government and private businesses in the US, following a trend seen elsewhere in places like China, Mr Nicholson told the BBC.
From BBC ● Aug. 15, 2025
It felt like mine, this intertwining of fennel and gruyere, two magnificent ingredients, becoming something even better than the sum of the parts.
From Salon ● Mar. 23, 2025
So my outfit is like intertwining my culture — I’m half Mexican, half Nicaraguan — with my best friend’s culture.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 1, 2024
He drew his sword and looked at it, and the intertwining shapes of red and gold; and the flowing characters of Númenor glinted like fire upon the blade.
From "The Return of the King" by J.R.R. Tolkien
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.
