parse

American  

[pahrs, pahrz] / pɑrs, pɑrz /

verb (used with object)

• parses,
  present (3rd person singular)
• parsed,
  past participle,  past
• parsing
  present participle

1. to analyze (a sentence) in terms of grammatical constituents, identifying the parts of speech, syntactic relations, etc.

2. to describe (a word in a sentence) grammatically, identifying the part of speech, inflectional form, syntactic function, etc.

3. to analyze (something, as a speech or behavior) to discover its implications or uncover a deeper meaning.

   Political columnists were in their glory, parsing the president's speech on the economy in minute detail.

4. Computers. to analyze (a string of characters) in order to associate groups of characters with the syntactic units of the underlying grammar.

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verb (used without object)

• parses,
  present (3rd person singular)
• parsed,
  past participle,  past
• parsing
  present participle

1. to be able to be parsed; lend itself to parsing.

   Sorry, but your concluding paragraph simply doesn't parse.

parse British  

/ pɑːz /

verb

1. to assign constituent structure to (a sentence or the words in a sentence)

2. (intr) (of a word or linguistic element) to play a specified role in the structure of a sentence

3. computing to analyse the source code of a computer program to make sure that it is structurally correct before it is compiled and turned into machine code

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Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• parser
  noun
• parsing
  noun
• misparse
  verb (used with object)
• parsable
  adjective
• unparsed
  adjective

Inflected Forms

Participles

• parsing
  present
• parsed
  past

Conjugated Forms

Present

• parse
  simple
• parses
  simple
• have parsed
  perfect
• has parsed
  perfect
• am parsing
  progressive
• are parsing
  progressive
• is parsing
  progressive
• have been parsing
  perfect progressive
• has been parsing
  perfect progressive

Past

• parsed
  simple
• had parsed
  perfect
• was parsing
  progressive
• were parsing
  progressive
• had been parsing
  perfect progressive

Future

• will parse
  simple
• will have parsed
  perfect
• will be parsing
  progressive
• will have been parsing
  perfect progressive

Etymology

Origin of parse

First recorded in 1545–55; from Latin pars “part,” as in pars ōrātiōnis “part of speech”

Explanation

When you parse a sentence, you break it into parts and analyze each element carefully. When your sweetheart shouts "You never listen!" it's a bad idea to parse that by replying, "I just heard you, so I must be listening." The ability to successfully parse language is important. A binding legal contract, for example, should be read very carefully so you know exactly what's going on. You can also parse things that are more personal. You might exhaustively parse the comments of the guy you have a desperate crush on for any hint that he shares your passionate feelings. The sad truth of the matter? If you have to parse, he probably doesn't love you. Apply your parsing skills elsewhere!

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

parse parses parsed parsing

So executives are asking employees to send more of those chats to group threads, which agents can parse.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 25, 2026

Investors will also be looking forward to Fed Chair Kevin Warsh’s keynote address from the Jackson Hole, Wyo., economic-policy symposium on Friday, hoping to parse indications of the Fed’s strategy on interest rates.

From MarketWatch ● Aug. 23, 2026

Unsettling to many, beloved by more, he refused to explain his work, allowing and challenging his audience to parse through it and imbue their own meanings and discoveries.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 18, 2026

“Market participants will parse the minutes for validation or contrast with the meeting’s hawkish comments,” the team says.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 6, 2026

Ambata did, but Kathy still could not parse the words.

From "Zeitoun" by Dave Eggers

And that’s a common scenario for AT&T as it parses through all the options out there.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 12, 2026

Rebecca Onion parses the book for clues that could explain the film’s cryptic ending.

From Slate ● Dec. 15, 2023

She can hear it in the audible gasps of onlookers as she parses a moment in the pandemic that they had forgotten.

From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 14, 2023

Even as the Fed parses the progress it has made on inflation, she said it would "stay the course."

From Reuters ● Jan. 19, 2023

"The rover currently parses the signal into bytes, then identifies the specific sequence the Hab sends. That way, natural radio waves won't throw off the homing. If the bytes aren't right, the rover ignores them."

From "The Martian" by Andy Weir

Together, Flynn and Teruko parsed through her life stories to give the show an arc.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 3, 2026

For his part, Thomas writes as though history resides principally in legal texts, 19th-century dictionaries, and carefully parsed debates over sovereignty.

From Slate ● Jul. 2, 2026

Yardeni and his team parsed the official data released monthly by the Treasury Department, and found that foreign investors poured more than $1.4 trillion into U.S. assets during the 12 months through April 2026.

From MarketWatch ● Jun. 28, 2026

Despite the mountain of data that we parsed through—145,767 inputs in all—our model, like any model, has limitations.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 8, 2026

Suppose a reader has successfully parsed a sentence and now has an understanding of who did what to whom or what is true of what.

From "The Sense of Style" by Steven Pinker

In the end, Schiller has a go at parsing her own motivations.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 20, 2026

Another challenge will be parsing jurisdictions and liability for assets that cross international waters or are damaged in combat—such as subsea data cables or energy pipelines.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 4, 2026

For investors parsing the regulatory filings, these industry trends supporting the stock carry far more weight than a few automated transactions.

From Barron's ● Jun. 18, 2026

Eastern Daylight Time, is worth quoting and parsing:

From Slate ● Jun. 11, 2026

If a command was too complex, the game’s simple parsing engine wouldn’t be able to understand it.

From "Ready Player One: A Novel" by Ernest Cline

Related Words

• audit
• check
• check out
• consider
• criticize
• delve into
• explore
• inspect
• investigate
• ponder
• pore over
• probe
• read
• research
• review
• scan
• screen
• scrutinize
• study
• survey