rewind
Americanverb (used with or without object)
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rewinds,
present (3rd person singular)
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rewound,
past participle, past
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rewinded,
past
-
rewinding
present participle
-
to wind again.
-
to wind back to or toward the beginning; reverse.
noun
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an act or instance of rewinding.
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Recording.
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a function of an audio or video recorder or player, as a cassette deck or DVR, that returns the audio or video incrementally to an earlier point.
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the button or other control that activates this reversing function.
-
-
a camera control or mechanism used to wind film back into a film cassette.
verb
noun
-
something rewound
-
the act of rewinding
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
rewindsimple
-
rewindssimple
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have rewoundperfect
-
has rewoundperfect
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am rewindingprogressive
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are rewindingprogressive
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is rewindingprogressive
-
have been rewindingperfect progressive
-
has been rewindingperfect progressive
Past
-
rewindedsimple
-
rewoundsimple
-
had rewoundperfect
-
was rewindingprogressive
-
were rewindingprogressive
-
had been rewindingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of rewind
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:
We can’t rewind the tape without the war to see if its warning was valid.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 11, 2026
The team attempted to "rewind the clock" by about 80 million years, which is how long the rock is estimated to have been exposed at the Martian surface.
From Science Daily ● Feb. 12, 2026
It was also possible to rewind livestreams from the start, and download archived clips.
From BBC ● Feb. 5, 2026
When the Rams wincingly rewind the video of the collapse, they’ll be peering through the cracks in their fingers.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 19, 2025
“Did you see that? Alex, rewind the hologram thingy.”
From "The Manifestor Prophecy" by Angie Thomas
“Together,” Mr. Doherty notes, “the film inventory and the expert commentary created the archival documentary, the motion picture genre that preserves and rewinds our history.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 14, 2026
There’s a confusing beat when, without warning, the film switches cities and rewinds a day.
From Los Angeles Times ● Feb. 13, 2025
The film rewinds to December 1970 and the cusp of Christmas break for Barton, an Ivy League feeder school for boys in suburban Massachusetts.
From Salon ● Feb. 16, 2024
Unfortunately, the staging, with interstitial rewinds as seen in “Hamilton,” is so unclear you may have trouble following any of the outcomes, which all involve one of the regulars at Trish’s.
From New York Times ● Jun. 7, 2023
Werner rewinds the resistance track and splices the wires and plugs in the radio.
From "All the Light We Cannot See" by Anthony Doerr
When you hit the button, you’ll be rewinded two minutes back in the stream, Twitch tells The Verge.
From The Verge ● Oct. 20, 2021
"Nas," Duncan said as he rewound tape, "Nas."
From Salon ● May 14, 2023
While Morgan remotely rewound video for coaches on the bench to look at, Ohashi watched a higher up, wide-angle “coach’s camera” feed offering a better view of the play.
From Seattle Times ● May 6, 2023
The accumulated mutations serve as a clock that, if calibrated with known dates, can be rewound to pinpoint the dates of divergences.
From Science Magazine ● Mar. 27, 2023
He rewound the video and brought the father and daughter over.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 23, 2023
But right then, Colin pulled the minirecorder out of his pocket and rewound it.
From "An Abundance of Katherines" by John Green
If this sounds like a lot of work, or unduly time-consuming, remember that it’s still a lot faster than rewinding weeks of work or a mistaken decision based on incorrect information.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 19, 2026
“That’s basically rewinding 10 years of demand growth.”
From MarketWatch ● Apr. 15, 2026
In response, Ubisoft shut down its R6 servers and began to work on a "roll back" - essentially rewinding the clock so any purchases made prior to Saturday could be undone.
From BBC ● Dec. 29, 2025
The Muschiettis have a three-season plan for “Welcome to Derry,” with the potential second to be set in 1935 and the third rewinding to 1908.
From Salon ● Oct. 26, 2025
I suppose I should back up here, rewinding us through the heavy heat of that summer, through the disorienting haze of those long months after my father died.
From "Becoming" by Michelle Obama
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.
