regurgitate
Americanverb (used without object)
-
regurgitates,
present (3rd person singular)
-
regurgitated,
past participle, past
-
regurgitating
present participle
verb (used with object)
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regurgitates,
present (3rd person singular)
-
regurgitated,
past participle, past
-
regurgitating
present participle
-
to cause to surge or rush back; vomit.
-
to give back or repeat, especially something not fully understood or assimilated.
to regurgitate the teacher's lectures on the exam.
verb
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to vomit forth (partially digested food)
-
(of some birds and certain other animals) to bring back to the mouth (undigested or partly digested food with which to feed the young)
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(intr) to be cast up or out, esp from the mouth
-
(intr) med (of blood) to flow backwards, in a direction opposite to the normal one, esp through a defective heart valve
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
regurgitatesimple
-
regurgitatessimple
-
have regurgitatedperfect
-
has regurgitatedperfect
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am regurgitatingprogressive
-
are regurgitatingprogressive
-
is regurgitatingprogressive
-
have been regurgitatingperfect progressive
-
has been regurgitatingperfect progressive
Past
-
regurgitatedsimple
-
had regurgitatedperfect
-
was regurgitatingprogressive
-
were regurgitatingprogressive
-
had been regurgitatingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of regurgitate
1645–55; < Medieval Latin regurgitātus (past participle of regurgitāre ), equivalent to re- re- + gurgit-, stem of gurges whirlpool, flood, stream + -ātus -ate 1
Explanation
To regurgitate is to bring already swallowed food back up through one's throat and out the mouth. Not so nice in humans, but much more understandable (if still gross) in birds — who feed their baby chicks by regurgitating. Finished cramming for your exam? Ready to do a data dump? Then you're about to regurgitate all you've learned — repeat information verbatim without any real understanding or analysis of it. Don't worry, everyone does it, from high school and college students, to grown-ups in corporate boardrooms.
Vocabulary lists containing regurgitate
Freak the Mighty
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The Stars Beneath Our Feet
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The Hot Zone
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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:
AI matchmaking users have complained about limited prospect pools, generic descriptions of potential matches, and chatbots that simply regurgitate their preferences.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 3, 2026
It can also be passed directly to chicks when adults regurgitate food.
From BBC ● Apr. 9, 2026
Traditional media face threats from chatbots and Google's AI overviews, which regurgitate content without users visiting original sites, eroding traffic and revenue.
From Barron's ● Nov. 26, 2025
While they hear everything, there is little they can do other than regurgitate the info online.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 10, 2025
Mother looks like she is going to regurgitate last night’s dinner.
From "The Adoration of Jenna Fox" by Mary E. Pearson
Gibson often regurgitates messages from personal finance and investing books that he reads, or from YouTube videos he watches about finance for beginners.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 16, 2026
In other words, Musk, who imbibes and regurgitates bad memes, has built a machine that is also designed to imbibe and regurgitate bad memes.
From Slate ● Nov. 7, 2023
The 1995 Korean War Veterans Memorial is centered on figurative sculptures; the 2004 World War II Memorial regurgitates classical architectural banalities — arches, pylons and wreaths — on a scale worthy of Albert Speer.
From Washington Post ● Nov. 16, 2022
The ruminant regurgitates cud from the rumen, and the food is passed into the abomasum for water removal and then into the small and large intestines for nutrient and further water absorption.
From Textbooks ● Jun. 9, 2022
He coughs a deep cough and regurgitates something into the bag.
From "The Hot Zone" by Richard Preston
Smaller accounts regurgitated Owens’ claims in their own videos, with no apparent value added.
From Slate ● Jul. 21, 2026
Watching AI-generated content, which is regurgitated again and again, fed to a zombie audience that no longer cares.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 23, 2026
We’ve seen stem cell hype regurgitated by otherwise respectable news organizations, abetted by high-profile athletes attesting to miracle cures of their musculoskeletal ailments.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 17, 2025
They’re not up there playing regurgitated versions of “Medicine Bow,” “Don’t Bang The Drum” or “Fisherman’s Blues.”
From Salon ● Oct. 7, 2025
Maybe three seconds later she started to heave, literally almost regurgitated into my mouth.
From "Burning Blue" by Paul Griffin
With movies like “Obsession” and “Backrooms” already dominating the early-summer box office, the industry is rethinking its iron-grip commitment to regurgitating the same films audiences have seen 100 times before, in slightly different ways.
From Salon ● Jun. 10, 2026
Does being faithful mean regurgitating an author’s words?
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 20, 2025
Instead of listening to boring lectures regurgitating scientific papers they’d already read, why not present video footage?
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 25, 2024
A culture that is fed entirely by regurgitating existing ideas is a stagnant one.
From New York Times ● May 10, 2023
The woman sounds like a machine regurgitating information.
From "I Am Not Your Perfect Mexican Daughter" by Erika L. Sánchez
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.
