thicken
Americanverb (used with or without object)
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thickens,
present (3rd person singular)
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thickened,
past participle, past
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thickening
present participle
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to make or become thick or thicker.
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to make or grow more intense, profound, intricate, or complex.
The plot thickens.
verb
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to make or become thick or thicker
thicken the soup by adding flour
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(intr) to become more involved
the plot thickened
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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thickensimple
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thickenssimple
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have thickenedperfect
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has thickenedperfect
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am thickeningprogressive
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are thickeningprogressive
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is thickeningprogressive
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have been thickeningperfect progressive
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has been thickeningperfect progressive
Past
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thickenedsimple
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had thickenedperfect
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was thickeningprogressive
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were thickeningprogressive
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had been thickeningperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of thicken
1375–1425; late Middle English thiknen < Old Norse thykkna. See thick, -en 1
Explanation
To thicken is to become denser or to make something thicker. When you accidentally burn dinner, the smoke in the kitchen thickens. Time to get the fire extinguisher. There are two ways to thicken: to become thick or to make thick. Cooks often use flour or cornstarch to thicken sauces. And when you add flour to your brownie batter, you thicken it. An earlier, now obsolete meaning was "to crowd together." The phrase "the plot thickens" means that a situation is becoming more and more complicated or interesting.
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:
His shredding effect on electric guitar and multi-tracking to thicken his instrument’s sound dominate.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 15, 2026
From next year's contest, the backing track may not "unduly assist" the singer or singers on stage, for example by including a pre-recorded voice singing the main melody to thicken or support the live performance.
From BBC ● Aug. 12, 2026
The technique here is simple: Roast the berries until their juices thicken, chill them completely, then blend with yogurt and buttermilk until smooth.
From Salon ● Jul. 21, 2026
But forecasters at the National Weather Service warned the smoke may thicken overnight into Saturday morning.
From Barron's ● Jul. 17, 2026
She could almost feel her joints thicken and knot.
From "East of Eden" by John Steinbeck
A mysterious discovery thickens the plot—were the Olympic Games invented by women?
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 9, 2026
To that, add your reserved hard-boiled yolks, blended in until the mixture thickens and turns almost custard-like.
From Salon ● Apr. 14, 2026
When heating eases, the shell thickens again as water refreezes.
From Science Daily ● Mar. 2, 2026
Few writers since Henry James can create an atmosphere of doubt around events and character as effectively as this author does, and in “Venetian Vespers” the miasma thickens at every turn.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 9, 2025
In each black space I find, I think I locate someone, but each time, the darkness thickens and that’s all there is.
From "I Am the Messenger" by Markus Zusak
When the sleepiest central bank on Earth becomes the one that matters, the plot has thickened.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 28, 2026
But for deeper flavor, transfer the skillet to the oven and bake for 20–25 minutes, until bubbling around the edges and slightly thickened.
From Salon ● May 19, 2026
Titania's surface features may therefore reflect a cycle in which the ice shell first thinned and later thickened again.
From Science Daily ● Mar. 2, 2026
To get older, wiser and have your skin thickened by all the slings and arrows?
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 18, 2026
And almost every day they ate blood stew, thickened with barley and onions and chunks of meat.
From "A Dance with Dragons" by George R. R. Martin
For hypertrophic cardiomyopathy—the thickening of heart muscles—it was 56 steps.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 19, 2026
"Symptoms like thickening and laxity of the skin, so-called 'elephant skin', extreme shedding and sharply defined areas of redness next to normal skin."
From BBC ● Mar. 28, 2026
In the new study, the researchers protected the bacteria by enclosing them, along with magnetic particles, inside small droplets of sodium alginate, a thickening ingredient commonly found in foods.
From Science Daily ● Nov. 21, 2025
They gather shortly after daybreak outside a minimarket, the tropical heat thickening, the dawn haze in lethargic retreat.
From Los Angeles Times ● Mar. 21, 2025
It was not so much clouding up as thickening, somehow, from every direction at once, the blank blue gone to haze.
From "Tuck Everlasting" by Natalie Babbit
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.
