jive
Americannoun
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swing music or early jazz.
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the jargon associated with swing music and early jazz.
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Slang. deceptive, exaggerated, or meaningless talk.
Don't give me any of that jive!
verb (used without object)
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jives,
present (3rd person singular)
-
jived,
past participle, past
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jiving
present participle
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to play jive.
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to dance to jive; jitterbug.
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Slang. to engage in kidding, teasing, or exaggeration.
verb (used with object)
-
jives,
present (3rd person singular)
-
jived,
past participle, past
-
jiving
present participle
adjective
noun
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a style of lively and jerky dance performed to jazz and, later, to rock and roll, popular esp in the 1940s and 1950s
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Also called: jive talk. a variety of American slang spoken chiefly by Black people, esp jazz musicians
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slang deliberately misleading or deceptive talk
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( as modifier )
jive talk
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verb
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(intr) to dance the jive
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slang to mislead; tell lies (to)
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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jivesimple
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jivessimple
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have jivedperfect
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has jivedperfect
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am jivingprogressive
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are jivingprogressive
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is jivingprogressive
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have been jivingperfect progressive
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has been jivingperfect progressive
Past
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jivedsimple
-
had jivedperfect
-
was jivingprogressive
-
were jivingprogressive
-
had been jivingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of jive
First recorded in 1925–30; origin obscure; alleged to be an alteration of gibe 1, though the shift in sense and phonetic change are unexplained
Explanation
Jive is a lively type of music that first became popular in the 1930s. If you’ve seen movies with people wearing 1930s clothing fast dancing and spinning around, chances are they’re dancing to jive music. You can listen to jive or you can jive, because the word is both a noun and a verb. When you jive, be prepared to do a lot of spinning and swinging. It's often done to a style of big band music called "swing," because the dancers hold hands and swing each other around. Jive also means glib, fancy talk. If you're bragging about things you didn't even do, someone might tell you to quit your jive.
Vocabulary lists containing jive
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:
Just because a filmmaker does something with one film that a viewer may not jive with doesn’t mean their work should be refuted forevermore.
From Salon ● Feb. 23, 2026
Cantrell says he’s experimenting with “vibe coding External link,” which I hear a lot, and sometimes mistakenly call jive coding, which works, too.
From Barron's ● Feb. 13, 2026
Back in the actual 1990s, ice dancers cycled through traditional dances: samba, blues, polka, rumba, quickstep, tango, jive, paso doble, Viennese waltz.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 9, 2026
The pair performed routines including a show dance to Rain On Me by Lady Gaga and Ariana Grande, a Paso Doble to Dream On by Aerosmith, and a jive to Proud Mary.
From BBC ● Dec. 20, 2025
“Some jive flying, but look at her strut.”
From "Song of Solomon" by Toni Morrison
But it also jives with what’s happening in artificial intelligence financing.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 1, 2026
He had been a singles skater but turning jumps into jives is not an overnight job.
From BBC ● Mar. 31, 2025
Standard time, the group argues, better jives with the movement of the sun and the circadian rhythm, or body clock, of human beings.
From Washington Times ● Mar. 11, 2023
By checking in on irrigation systems and soil wetness, especially during the early transplant/growing days, you'll work out a routine that jives for your specific plan.
From Salon ● Jun. 11, 2022
So now my jives are off: pray Heaven he be here!
From Beaumont & Fletcher's Works (2 of 10) - the Humourous Lieutenant by Francis Beaumont
So grateful for all the success — it’s really cool that people have jived with it and listened to it the way they have.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 17, 2026
If someone came to me and was like, you could do this cool thing for Netflix or whatever and it really jived with my life, I would do it, but I don’t know.
From The Verge ● Aug. 24, 2021
But even as costumed fans shimmied, jived and reminisced, the talk was of an uncertain future.
From BBC ● Jun. 17, 2020
“I figured new league, some of the teams might not have jived yet, so I thought it was a good idea to take all the unders.”
From Seattle Times ● Feb. 13, 2019
He juked and jived and spun and danced and darted, and he left them squeezing handfuls of air.
From "Maniac Magee" by Jerry Spinelli
The contrasts between the walkouts was stark, with Thainara enthusiastically jiving her way to the octagon and McCann showing typical focus and intensity.
From BBC ● Mar. 22, 2025
Is hand jiving to Dancing Queen from inside a stationary Ford Focus on your bucket list?
From The Guardian ● Jun. 22, 2020
In Tenebaum’s hands he’s a mix of James Brown, Little Richard and the jiving genie in “Aladdin.”
From Seattle Times ● May 26, 2017
The young guard Irving can call to mind a young Earl Monroe, a nervous breakdown collection of jiving sidesteps and spins and jukes.
From New York Times ● Jun. 3, 2016
She drags me onto the dance floor, jiving and snapping her fingers.
From "Water for Elephants" by Sara Gruen
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