starve
Americanverb (used without object)
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starves,
present (3rd person singular)
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starved,
past participle, past
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starving
present participle
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to die or perish from lack of food or nourishment.
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to be in the process of perishing or suffering severely from hunger.
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to suffer from extreme poverty and need.
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to feel a strong need or desire.
The child was starving for affection.
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Chiefly British Dialect. to perish or suffer extremely from cold.
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Obsolete. to die.
verb (used with object)
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starves,
present (3rd person singular)
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starved,
past participle, past
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starving
present participle
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to cause to starve; kill, weaken, or reduce by lack of food.
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to subdue, or force to some condition or action, by hunger.
to starve a besieged garrison into a surrender.
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to cause to suffer for lack of something needed or craved.
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Chiefly British Dialect. to cause to perish, or to suffer extremely, from cold.
verb
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to die or cause to die from lack of food
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to deprive (a person or animal) or (of a person, etc) to be deprived of food
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informal (intr) to be very hungry
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to deprive or be deprived (of something necessary), esp so as to cause suffering or malfunctioning
the engine was starved of fuel
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to bring (to) a specified condition by starving
to starve someone into submission
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archaic to be or cause to be extremely cold
Synonym Usage
See hungry.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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starvernoun
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half-starvedadjective
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half-starvingadjective
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self-starvedadjective
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unstarvedadjective
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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starvesimple
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starvessimple
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have starvedperfect
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has starvedperfect
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am starvingprogressive
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are starvingprogressive
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is starvingprogressive
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have been starvingperfect progressive
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has been starvingperfect progressive
Past
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starvedsimple
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had starvedperfect
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was starvingprogressive
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were starvingprogressive
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had been starvingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of starve
First recorded before 1000; Middle English sterven, Old English steorfan “to die”; cognate with German sterben
Explanation
The verb starve means suffering or death caused by a lack of food, though people also use it as a dramatic way to say they are hungry, as in, "If we don't start cooking dinner now, I think I'll starve." The word starve has origins in the Old English word steorfan, meaning “to die.” It is true that if you don't eat for a period of time, you could starve, meaning die from hunger. Today, starve is also used to describe less severe limitations on food, such as when you tell your friend, "I have to go to lunch now. I'm starving." This is a way of describing discomfort caused by hunger.
Vocabulary lists containing starve
"When Cultures Meet"
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Cormac McCarthy's "The Road"
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Excerpt from "A Raisin in the Sun"
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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:
Environmental advocates say it would starve the Delta of needed water and threaten fish that are already in severe decline.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 19, 2026
Joshua Kushner and his family, one imagines, will not starve.
From Salon ● Aug. 2, 2026
However, not only do these chemicals affect the bees directly, they can also remove important plants that they rely on for food causing them to starve.
From Science Daily ● Jul. 29, 2026
He fears prey availability has not recovered enough to support tigers, who could starve.
From Barron's ● Jul. 8, 2026
It also meant they weren’t going to starve or freeze to death in the street.
From "Ready Player One: A Novel" by Ernest Cline
And as the government shutdown starves the markets of official data, any individual announcement from a company can take on more meaning.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 28, 2025
When society fails to honor difference, it starves itself of innovation, empathy and depth.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 19, 2025
It isolates the cell from the surrounding tissue and essentially starves it of nutrients.
From Science Daily ● Mar. 28, 2024
Granted, the holiest of high holidays in all of American sportsballs never starves for attention.
From Salon ● Feb. 10, 2024
“Nobody in Germany starves, and few, if any, go hungry,” he wrote.
From "Hitler Youth: Growing Up in Hitler's Shadow" by Susan Campbell Bartoletti
Investors are starved for information in a new world of “terse” communication from the central bank.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 21, 2026
But the lack of braking points means the cars will be energy starved this year, so will be running with not much more than half the engines' full power at key points of the track.
From BBC ● Jul. 2, 2026
Knicks fans long starved of championship chances erupted.
From Barron's ● Jun. 11, 2026
The biggest criticism of the new cars this year has been the engines were energy starved because it was too difficult to recover sufficient energy around a lap to meet the maximum allowance.
From BBC ● Jun. 10, 2026
“It’ll do you good! You looked starved to death!”
From "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" by Roald Dahl
"It's causing huge environmental problems... we have more food in the world, but there are more than ever people who are malnourished and starving," he said.
From Barron's ● Sep. 3, 2026
Environmentalists say the wall will accelerate erosion elsewhere while starving the neighboring salt marsh of sediment, hurting wildlife.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 8, 2026
That’s necessary magic in an age that’s starving for it.
From Salon ● Jul. 8, 2026
The oil could also lead to birds sinking and drowning, it said, and the loss of a parent could lead to gull chicks starving to death.
From BBC ● Jul. 2, 2026
Returning, he gave the venison to his starving family and to Tallow, who shared it out to Auntie Muskrat, to LaPautre’s hungry children, and to Fishtail.
From "The Birchbark House" by Louise Erdrich
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.
