sieve

American  

[siv] / sɪv /

noun

• sieves
  plural

1. an instrument with a meshed or perforated bottom, used for separating coarse from fine parts of loose matter, for straining liquids, etc., especially one with a circular frame and fine meshes or perforations.

2. a person who cannot keep a secret.

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verb (used with or without object)

• sieves,
  present (3rd person singular)
• sieved,
  past participle,  past
• sieving
  present participle

1. to put or force through a sieve; sift.

sieve British  

/ sɪv /

noun

1. a device for separating lumps from powdered material, straining liquids, grading particles, etc, consisting of a container with a mesh or perforated bottom through which the material is shaken or poured

2. rare a person who gossips and spreads secrets

3. a very poor memory

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verb

1. to pass or cause to pass through a sieve

2. to separate or remove (lumps, materials, etc) by use of a sieve

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• sievelike
  adjective
• unsieved
  adjective

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• sieves
  plural

Participles

• sieving
  present
• sieved
  past

Conjugated Forms

Present

• sieve
  simple
• sieves
  simple
• have sieved
  perfect
• has sieved
  perfect
• am sieving
  progressive
• are sieving
  progressive
• is sieving
  progressive
• have been sieving
  perfect progressive
• has been sieving
  perfect progressive

Past

• sieved
  simple
• had sieved
  perfect
• was sieving
  progressive
• were sieving
  progressive
• had been sieving
  perfect progressive

Future

• will sieve
  simple
• will have sieved
  perfect
• will be sieving
  progressive
• will have been sieving
  perfect progressive

Etymology

Origin of sieve

First recorded before 900; Middle English sive, Old English sife; cognate with Dutch zeef, German Sieb; cf. sift

Compare meaning

How does sieve compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:

• sieve vs. strainer
• colander vs. sieve

Explanation

A sieve is a mesh strainer used to separate lumps and clumps from the fine material. Sieves are handy for everything from sifting flour to prospecting for gold — anything where you need to separate the big from the small. If you’re an archaeologist, you've probably used various sorts of sifters and shakers to sieve through the soil to recover even the tiniest artifacts. If your interests run more to building sandcastles, you’ve probably got a sieve in your beach bag, along with the shovels and pails. If you keep forgetting things, you can describe your "mind as a sieve," since it doesn’t seem to hold much.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

sieve sieves sieved sieving

"It was filthy, dirty and it leaked like a sieve for many years," he said in a White House video.

From Barron's ● May 15, 2026

The average American home is about as airtight and well-insulated as a metal sieve.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 21, 2025

If you want a silky texture, strain through a fine-mesh sieve.

From Salon ● Jun. 2, 2025

Yoakam’s “Greater Bakersfield” is the sieve through which much of “Brighter Days” filtered.

From Los Angeles Times ● Nov. 14, 2024

His hands would be swollen and painful from sifting the heavy, wet soil through his sieve.

From "Taking Flight: From War Orphan to Star Ballerina" by Michaela DePrince

Citizen scientists will then be encouraged to gather sediment from rooftops and gutters and use magnets, sieves, and microscopes provided by the project to isolate potential micrometeorites.

From BBC ● Apr. 4, 2026

But soon after the scientists — of the trained, in-training and citizen variety — shimmied large nets that functioned as sieves into the brackish water, gleeful cries began to ring out.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jan. 23, 2025

Around her, amid the red flags of labor unions, were the sounds of myriad utensils from a typical French kitchen: sieves, lids and frying pans banged in rhythm with metal and wooden spoons.

From New York Times ● May 22, 2023

Human beings do not exist in vacuums; we are sieves for the experiences, cultures and socioeconomic systems that entrap us.

From Salon ● Aug. 18, 2019

It’s as quiet as a chess tournament except for the clinking of hammers, the shaking of sieves, and the low buzz of conversation between colleagues.

From "Linked" by Gordon Korman

The fermented BSG is then dried, ground into a powder, sieved, and spun in a centrifuge to separate the protein, which would float to the top from the rest of the mixture.

From Science Daily ● Apr. 11, 2024

The disturbed soil removed from the trenches is carefully sieved.

From BBC ● Jul. 31, 2023

In 1962 Heinz Stolp, a researcher in Berlin, was searching for new viruses when he ran out of the filters that sieved them from his samples.

From Scientific American ● Sep. 5, 2022

Other condiments shunned by connoisseurs but enjoyed by many are sieved egg yolks, finely chopped egg whites, and minced onion or fresh-snipped chives.

From Seattle Times ● Dec. 4, 2021

He and the others sieved out insects and added water as needed.

From "The House of the Scorpion" by Nancy Farmer

The successful sieving of the fuel molecules is achieved via selective proton transfers due to steric hindrance on holey graphene sheets that have chemical functionalization and act as proton-exchange membranes.

From Science Daily ● Sep. 22, 2023

“Children recognize sand as a creative material suitable for pouring, scooping, sieving, raking, and measuring,” it said.

From Washington Times ● Nov. 4, 2021

After sieving out the large particles, they filtered the water to collect the eDNA.

From Washington Post ● Apr. 30, 2021

We recycled and reused pretty much everything from stationery to clothes, bed linen, old tights for sieving my dad's homemade wine, vegetable peelings and so on.

From BBC ● Apr. 16, 2016

The stirring, sieving, settling, and bailing were repeated any number of times, until Min was satisfied with the residue.

From "A Single Shard" by Linda Sue Park

Related Words

• colander