beeline
Americannoun
noun
Etymology
Origin of beeline
Explanation
A beeline is the swiftest, most direct route between two points. If you are shopping at the mall on a weekend afternoon and you see an empty parking space, you should make a beeline for it or risk circling the lot for hours. The word beeline combines the words bee and line. The idea behind the word is the belief that a bee, when it is done feeding, will take the shortest path back to its hive without delay or meandering. So beeline not only has the sense of being a direct route, but also that there is some haste behind the action. If you make a beeline for the chocolate at a party, you went straight to the dessert table without eating dinner first.
Vocabulary lists containing beeline
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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.
But Le Tout Paris has been making a beeline for the bridge, and even the sun, which spent much of August here wrapped in clouds, has reappeared.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 7, 2026
In the first, Portland All-Star Deni Avdija made a beeline to the rim.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 2, 2026
González made a beeline to his wife of five decades, and for the first time all night they did what they had come to do: They danced.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 4, 2026
Cunnah "made a beeline" for Manchester, hired a car and drove to Barnsley, where Hanna lives.
From BBC ● Feb. 17, 2026
Michael made a beeline for the fiction section, but Ridge slowed down.
From "The First State of Being" by Erin Entrada Kelly
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.
