hollow
Americanadjective
-
hollower,
comparative
-
hollowest
superlative
-
having a space or cavity inside; not solid; empty.
a hollow sphere.
-
having a depression or concavity.
a hollow surface.
-
sunken, as the cheeks or eyes.
-
(of sound) not resonant; dull, muffled, or deep.
a hollow voice.
-
without real or significant worth; meaningless.
a hollow victory.
-
insincere or false.
hollow compliments.
-
hungry; having an empty feeling.
I feel absolutely hollow, so let's eat.
noun
-
hollows
plural
-
an empty space within anything; a hole, depression, or cavity.
-
a valley.
They took the sheep to graze in the hollow.
-
Foundry. a concavity connecting two surfaces otherwise intersecting at an obtuse angle.
verb (used with object)
-
hollows,
present (3rd person singular)
-
hollowed,
past participle, past
-
hollowing
present participle
-
to make hollow (often followed byout ).
to hollow out a log.
-
to form by making something hollow (often followed byout ).
to hollow a place in the sand;
boats hollowed out of logs.
verb (used without object)
-
hollows,
present (3rd person singular)
-
hollowed,
past participle, past
-
hollowing
present participle
adverb
idioms
adjective
-
having a hole, cavity, or space within; not solid
-
having a sunken area; concave
-
recessed or deeply set
hollow cheeks
-
(of sounds) as if resounding in a hollow place
-
without substance or validity
-
hungry or empty
-
insincere; cynical
-
the capacity to eat or drink a lot without ill effects
adverb
noun
-
a cavity, opening, or space in or within something
-
a depression or dip in the land
verb
-
to make or become hollow
-
to form (a hole, cavity, etc) or (of a hole, etc) to be formed
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Adjectives
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
hollowsimple
-
hollowssimple
-
have hollowedperfect
-
has hollowedperfect
-
am hollowingprogressive
-
are hollowingprogressive
-
is hollowingprogressive
-
have been hollowingperfect progressive
-
has been hollowingperfect progressive
Past
-
hollowedsimple
-
had hollowedperfect
-
was hollowingprogressive
-
were hollowingprogressive
-
had been hollowingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of hollow
First recorded before 900; Middle English holow, holw(e), Old English holh “a hollow place”; akin to hole
Explanation
If something is hollow, it is empty on the inside. A chocolate Easter bunny looks like so much chocolate until you realize that it is hollow and quickly eaten. The idea of emptiness is apparent in the other uses for hollow too. A valley between mountains is called a hollow and if you're really thin, you may have hollow cheeks. Things like words and promises are hollow if the person uttering them does not intend to keep them. And a hollow victory is not very satisfying, as it means that you have reached your goal, but lost something more important along the way.
Vocabulary lists containing hollow
The SAT: Words to Capture Tone, List 5
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The New SAT: Words to Capture Tone
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Excerpt from "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer"
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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:
Its public statements “proved hollow when it came to taking disciplinary measures against offending students and faculty.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 17, 2026
They are creative projects with the sneaky ability to hollow you out sometimes, especially when the story requires you to watch someone move through a series of the hardest days of their life.
From Salon ● Jul. 28, 2026
"Now they tell me he will be gone -- my heart feels hollow."
From Barron's ● Jul. 15, 2026
At the same time, generations of owls continually deposited bones throughout the cave, providing countless hollow tooth sockets that solitary bees could use.
From Science Daily ● Jul. 5, 2026
I sighed and thought my master’s soul was as hollow as a worm-eaten pistachio.
From "The Many Assassinations of Samir, the Seller of Dreams" by Daniel Nayeri
“A persistent contraction of this kind hollows out the pipeline of future experienced workers, causing declines in aggregate productivity as well as imposing cohort-specific scarring.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 29, 2026
Some create burrows in the ground, others use cavities in wood such as tree hollows or fallen branches, and some nest inside plant stems or small existing holes in twigs.
From Science Daily ● Jun. 18, 2026
A nation that teaches fear as a civic virtue hollows itself out from within.
From Salon ● Dec. 21, 2025
These include tree planting or the digging of dips and hollows into the landscape, but are often hampered because a large proportion of river catchments are on private land.
From BBC ● Dec. 9, 2025
Smokes and steams drifted in sullen clouds and lurked in the hollows.
From "The Two Towers" by J. R. R. Tolkien
Were the words that the cast spoke and sung hollower than they’d been 2½ weeks ago?
From Washington Post ● Jun. 26, 2022
Itgen isn’t sure why larger genomes lead to hollower hearts.
From Scientific American ● Feb. 2, 2022
In Kong: Skull Island, he’s bigger—much bigger, so much so that he could stand eye-to-antenna with the Empire State Building without needing to scale it—but he’s hollower, too.
From Slate ● Mar. 9, 2017
His hair grayer and thinner than in his mugshot from five years ago, and his cheeks a little hollower, Cho, now 56, sat through the two-week trial in a gray pinstripe suit, mustard tie and glasses.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 20, 2016
Then the clicking of its spikes against the stone suddenly turned into a deeper, hollower sound.
From "The Maze Runner" by James Dashner
In a world sorely lacking global leadership, champions of human rights stand poised to earn only the hollowest of victories.
From Washington Post ● Dec. 20, 2018
Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey was nominated for the presidential race, but it was the hollowest of victories.
From Washington Times ● Aug. 27, 2018
A motionless condition of matter is therefore one of the hollowest and most absurd notions, a mere delirium.
From Landmarks of Scientific Socialism "Anti-Duehring" by Friedrich Engels
I think it is the hollowest and, I am sorry to say, the commonest, of all the fallacies in the history of the world in all stages of civilisation.
From Indian speeches (1907-1909) by John Morley
The hollowest of all gospels is the gospel of ease and comfort.
From Character by Samuel Smiles
Earlier this month, Burnham promised to revitalise Britain's "hollowed out" high streets by helping councils block new vaping and betting shops.
From BBC ● Aug. 27, 2026
Once a byword for joyful excess, Havana has been hollowed by blackouts, departures and deep uncertainty about its future.
From Barron's ● Aug. 18, 2026
The father of the bride who lets a chatbot draft his toast has hollowed out the ritual.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 17, 2026
Second, it hollowed out Congress’ power to enforce our constitutional promise of racial equality at the polls, insisting that Congress lacked the power to do more than prohibit purposeful racial discrimination.
From Slate ● Jul. 8, 2026
He began to carve thick chunks of charred meat off the bone as Tyrion hollowed out two heels of stale bread to serve as trenchers.
From "A Game of Thrones" by George R.R. Martin
“There’s essentially a hollowing out of the middle,” said Jared Walczak, senior fellow at the Tax Foundation.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 5, 2026
This was supposed to set out details of defence spending to modernise the military and reverse what he had called "the hollowing out" of the armed forces.
From BBC ● Jul. 20, 2026
In the 1980s, William Julius Wilson sounded the alarm on job loss hollowing out black communities.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 14, 2026
The hollowing out of military veterans from the government, particularly those with the most experience, only increases the importance of defense contractors who are following appropriate procedure.
From Slate ● Apr. 22, 2026
She herself was smoothing out a paddle to use in stirring the syrup, and just the day before Deydey had started hollowing a peeled, smooth piece of basswood for a trough.
From "The Birchbark House" by Louise Erdrich
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.
