breakfast
Americannoun
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breakfasts
plural
-
the first meal of the day; morning meal.
A hearty breakfast was served at 7 a.m.
-
the food eaten at the first meal of the day.
a breakfast of bacon and eggs.
verb (used without object)
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breakfasts,
present (3rd person singular)
-
breakfasted,
past participle, past
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breakfasting
present participle
verb (used with object)
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breakfasts,
present (3rd person singular)
-
breakfasted,
past participle, past
-
breakfasting
present participle
noun
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-
the first meal of the day
-
( as modifier )
breakfast cereal
a breakfast room
-
-
the food at this meal
-
(in the Caribbean) a midday meal
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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breakfastsimple
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breakfastssimple
-
have breakfastedperfect
-
has breakfastedperfect
-
am breakfastingprogressive
-
are breakfastingprogressive
-
is breakfastingprogressive
-
have been breakfastingperfect progressive
-
has been breakfastingperfect progressive
Past
-
breakfastedsimple
-
had breakfastedperfect
-
was breakfastingprogressive
-
were breakfastingprogressive
-
had been breakfastingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of breakfast
First recorded in 1425–75, breakfast is from the late Middle English word brekfast. See break, fast 2
Explanation
Breakfast is the first meal of the day, usually eaten in the morning. Eating a healthy breakfast may give you a boost of energy to start your day. The word breakfast comes from the idea of "breaking the fast" after a night of sleeping. A fast is a period of not eating. During sleep, the body goes without food for hours, so when you eat breakfast, you stop fasting and start eating again, restoring energy for the day ahead. Breakfast foods vary widely depending on culture and personal preference. Eggs, cereal, toast, pancakes, and fruit are commonly eaten for breakfast in some places. In other places, soup, salad, fish, and rice are preferred.
Vocabulary lists containing breakfast
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:
They usually have a line and a wait too, but this day there wasn’t and the breakfast buffet was really popping off.
From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 6, 2026
Ultra-processed foods include many everyday products, such as breakfast cereals, packaged bread, and instant soups.
From Science Daily ● Nov. 4, 2026
In one podcast episode, she described a breakfast area beside the kitchen, where a bench and the wall above it were intended to become a display for family photographs.
From MarketWatch ● Nov. 3, 2026
Tyce voiced her theory at breakfast, but turned her frustrations to Roxy, who felt Tyce had interrupted Duffy when defending herself.
From BBC ● Oct. 30, 2026
She’d be home by the time we sat down for breakfast, Uncle said.
From "Code Name Kingfisher" by Liz Kessler
I enjoyed classic Scottish food like full Scottish breakfasts with haggis and blood pudding; chicken rumbledethumps, a dish with mashed potatoes, cabbage and cheese; Tennents lager and single-malt Scotch.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 25, 2026
"I have weekly breakfasts, we have a tent at events like agricultural fairs," he told AFP.
From Barron's ● Oct. 13, 2026
For years, when I remembered those breakfasts, I focused on all the times I had said no.
From Salon ● Aug. 31, 2026
“It’s a place to help veterans work through the VA, to help veterans job source, to help veterans come together for Taco Tuesdays and breakfasts and dinners,” Chandler says.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 17, 2026
He smells safe, too, like sunlit walks in the orchard and silent breakfasts in the dining hall.
From "Insurgent" by Veronica Roth
Hazzard said the baboons were “well and resting” after their foiled escape attempt and had breakfasted on bananas, capsicum, apple and bread.
From The Guardian ● Feb. 26, 2020
In the morning, congratulating myself on not having used the emergency phone, I breakfasted on cloudberry doughnuts and homemade dried reindeer.
From The New Yorker ● Apr. 22, 2019
These genes were much more active when the men had fasted before exercise than when they had breakfasted.
From New York Times ● Apr. 26, 2017
Mitt Romney in 2012 famously declared in Mississippi that he'd just breakfasted on "a biscuit and some cheesy grits" — drawing groans from a crowd who knew he meant cheese grits.
From US News ● Feb. 19, 2016
They breakfasted together, sitting at one corner of the table with their knees touching.
From "Huntress" by Malinda Lo
A study published last week in “Communications Engineering” details a breakthrough in egg science that, if widely adopted, could alter the course of human breakfasting forever.
From Salon ● Feb. 11, 2025
Clients include breakfasting Qataris, construction and security guards off overnight shifts and, this week, tourists in soccer jerseys descending on the country, where foreigners, mostly migrant workers, form the bulk of the 3 million population.
From Reuters ● Nov. 24, 2022
In the future, you could be breakfasting on false banana or snacking on pandanus tree fruit.
From BBC ● May 21, 2022
Two majors after that, he won the 2018 PGA Championship in St. Louis after breakfasting on Sunday with a two-shot lead he treated without tremble.
From Washington Post ● May 18, 2019
The disorder left by the breakfasting bears had been cleared away.
From "The Book of Three" by Lloyd Alexander
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