route
Americannoun
-
routes
plural
-
a course, way, or road for passage or travel.
What's the shortest route to Boston?
-
a customary or regular line of passage or travel.
There's a ship from our company on the North Atlantic route.
-
a specific itinerary, round, or number of stops regularly visited by a person in the performance of their work or duty.
a newspaper route;
a mail carrier's route.
verb (used with object)
-
routes,
present (3rd person singular)
-
routed,
past participle, past
-
routing
present participle
-
to set the path of.
to route a tour.
-
to send or forward by a particular course or road.
It's the post office's job to route mail to its proper destination.
idioms
noun
-
the choice of roads taken to get to a place
-
a regular journey travelled
-
(capital) a main road between cities
Route 66
-
mountaineering the direction or course taken by a climb
-
med the means by which a drug or agent is administered or enters the body, such as by mouth or by injection
oral route
verb
Usage
When forming the present participle or verbal noun from the verb to route it is preferable to retain the e in order to distinguish the word from routing , the present participle or verbal noun from rout 1 , to defeat or rout 2 , to dig, rummage: the routeing of buses from the city centre to the suburbs . The spelling routing in this sense is, however, sometimes encountered, esp in American English
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
routesimple
-
routessimple
-
have routedperfect
-
has routedperfect
-
am routingprogressive
-
are routingprogressive
-
is routingprogressive
-
have been routingperfect progressive
-
has been routingperfect progressive
Past
-
routedsimple
-
had routedperfect
-
was routingprogressive
-
were routingprogressive
-
had been routingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of route
First recorded in 1175–1225; Middle English: “way, course,” from Old French, from Latin rupta (via) “broken (road),” feminine past participle of rumpere “to break”; cf. rout 1
Explanation
A route is a way for travel or movement, the path from point A to point B. A route can also be the method used for achieving a particular result, like going to school and working hard is your route to success. Route comes from an Old French word, rute, “road,” “way,” or “path” and the Latin rupta, “broken way” or “beaten way.” A route can be a highway, like Route 66, or all the places you pass through on the way somewhere, like using a map to find the shortest route. As a verb, route means "to send people or things on a particular course," like detour signs that route you through unfamiliar streets or a package that is routed through Cleveland on its way to you.
Vocabulary lists containing route
The Best Starting Words for Wordle
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Make a Break for It: Rupt
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American Football, 1st Quarter
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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:
A CeraVe TikTok touting a “looksmaxxing protocol” parodied “bone smashing” en route to advertising lotion, while Carl’s Jr. said its sandwich name conveys an “all-in mindset” in a culturally resonant way.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 21, 2026
It also accused the convoy of deviating from the route co-ordinated with the military.
From BBC ● Aug. 21, 2026
A Labour Party spokesperson said all young people "deserve a clear route to a good career" whether through "a properly funded apprenticeship, high-quality technical education or university".
From BBC ● Aug. 20, 2026
He added the receivers, in particular, are playing with confidence because of their detailed route work — precise depths, footwork, releases that are “NFL routes” as opposed to “seven-on-seven stuff.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 20, 2026
She tells me we’re driving the southern route, to avoid the snow.
From "The Wrong Way Home" by Kate O’Shaughnessy
With alternative shipping routes and ship-to-ship transfer of crude to avoid the Strait of Hormuz, the market is reaching a “sort of equilibrium” where operations aren’t as disrupted as much as before, he adds.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 21, 2026
The court ruling, issued on Monday, said ministry guidelines were already in place to ensure "unobstructed" elephant corridors, but those routes have often been impeded.
From Barron's ● Aug. 21, 2026
Planned measures include reducing the frequency of bin collections, closing heritage attractions, ending bus routes and - in the case of one council - completely removing sheltered housing support.
From BBC ● Aug. 20, 2026
Prime Minister Andy Burnham has said he wants teenagers to have technical routes into careers that could rival the path of a traditional university degree.
From BBC ● Aug. 20, 2026
His father, who had emigrated at the turn of the century from the city of Odessa in the Ukraine, worked mainly as a trucking clerk, dispatching drivers on their routes.
From "Drama High" by Michael Sokolove
His disappearance caused a panic among the defenders and they were routed.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 5, 2026
It was that public safety had to be routed through either federal or state policing for the claim to become legible.
From Slate ● Jul. 27, 2026
Tech firms were once again in the crosshairs, with South Korea's Kospi extending a painful selloff as chip titan SK hynix continued to be routed amid growing fears about the AI boom.
From Barron's ● Jul. 14, 2026
Aviation Minister JoBeth Coleby-Davis told reporters a plane had earlier routed back to Nassau when the pilot reported an issue.
From BBC ● Jul. 11, 2026
He puts Enrique with four immigrant men being routed to Orlando, Florida.
From "Enrique's Journey" by Sonia Nazario
The attack affected the communication operations of the fire and police departments, including the routing of 911 calls.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 9, 2026
A pipeline routing oil west across Saudi Arabia to a port on the Red Sea has allowed Riyadh to keep up export volumes during the war.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 27, 2026
The report documents instances that may constitute federal wire fraud, revealing that unsuspecting private donors who intended to support the congressionally chartered foundation were apparently surreptitiously handed Freedom 250’s bank account and routing numbers instead.
From Salon ● Jul. 4, 2026
It does this by checking a model’s request for tool authorization against an organization’s active directory and routing execution through compliance filters, he said.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 15, 2026
That same night, the Midland Lee Rebels finished the season by routing the Cooper Cougars, and the Midland High Bulldogs did likewise by beating the Abilene High Eagles.
From "Friday Night Lights: A Town, A Team, And A Dream" by H.G. Bissinger
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.
