vend
Americanverb (used with object)
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vends,
present (3rd person singular)
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vended,
past participle, past
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vending
present participle
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to sell as one's business or occupation, especially by peddling.
to vend flowers at a sidewalk stand.
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to give utterance to (opinions, ideas, etc.); publish.
verb (used without object)
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vends,
present (3rd person singular)
-
vended,
past participle, past
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vending
present participle
-
to engage in the sale of merchandise.
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to be disposed of by sale.
verb
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to sell or be sold
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to sell (goods) for a living
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rare (tr) to utter or publish (an opinion, etc)
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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venditionnoun
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revendverb (used with object)
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unvendableadjective
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unvendedadjective
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vendableadjective
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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vendsimple
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vendssimple
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have vendedperfect
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has vendedperfect
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am vendingprogressive
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are vendingprogressive
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is vendingprogressive
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have been vendingperfect progressive
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has been vendingperfect progressive
Past
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vendedsimple
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had vendedperfect
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was vendingprogressive
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were vendingprogressive
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had been vendingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of vend
1610–20; < Latin vendere to sell, contraction of vēnum (or vēnō ) dare to offer for sale; see venal
Explanation
When you vend, you sell something — for example, you might have a table at a crafts fair where you vend your line of hand-knit dog clothing. Typically, the verb vend is used when the seller is on the move in some way, setting up a stall in a street fair or hawking homemade cupcakes out of a minivan at high school football games. Another way to use vend is specifically "to sell something out of a machine," like the kind you put a dollar in and get a bag of chips in return. The Latin root is vendere, "to sell."
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:
He recalled that Bob Carr once built him a concrete ramp so he could vend from one of the permanent structures.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 6, 2024
Indigenous hop pickers also took the opportunity to vend their own goods to local Seattleites.
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 16, 2022
Mr. Rossi said that he argued in court that the state law overruled city regulations and allowed him to vend in areas that would otherwise be off limits.
From New York Times ● Aug. 28, 2020
With no houses to clean, no motorcycle taxis to drive and no markets to vend their wares, many face eviction and starvation.
From Time ● Apr. 7, 2020
“I believe that they vend foot- long hot dogs.”
From "A Confederacy of Dunces" by John Kennedy Toole
Walter vends its own beer, specially brewed for the venue in the village of Gijzegem.
From The Guardian ● Feb. 27, 2020
He vends excellent objects d'art undismayed before gargantuan plutocrats, penetrating their purses vastly, simply with the device of perfumed cigarettes, voluptuous oriental divans, scientific lighting, cutaway coat, and hauteur.
From Time Magazine Archive
The reading matter that he vends is stuff that an easygoing, careless public will not hasten to put aside voluntarily.
From Time Magazine Archive
The world should be particularly satisfied on this article before he vends his notes; for the discount of thirty per cent. is prodigious, and vastly more than I can conceive it ought to be.
From The Prose Works of Jonathan Swift, D.D. - Volume 07 Historical and Political Tracts-Irish by Temple Scott
Ay, and how should he who traffics with his beauty love the purchaser, any more than he who keeps a stall in the market-place and vends to the highest bidder?
From The Symposium by Henry Graham Dakyns
Since moving back to L.A. in 2014, Wang has vended at local farmers markets, hosted Chinese cooking demos at public libraries and helped staff Filipino restaurant Lasita, a crown jewel of Chinatown’s Far East Plaza.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 4, 2026
Tokens are required at the bar, annoyingly vended by machines.
From The Guardian ● Feb. 27, 2020
A snack bar vended an array of imported soft drinks, including a range of Coca-Cola products with Vietnamese packaging.
From New York Times ● Feb. 14, 2019
The New York Herald-Tribune bought the newspaper rights to publication and vended them to other papers.
From Time Magazine Archive
Banks now abound and brokers swarm where Loudon erst printed, and many millions worth of silk and woolen goods are every year sold where Gaine vended his big Bibles and his little story-books.
From Forgotten Books of the American Nursery A History of the Development of the American Story-Book by Rosalie Vrylina Halsey
Snap, which unveiled more powerful $2,195 augmented reality glasses this year, sold glasses that record video in bright yellow vending machines in 2016, but the product flopped.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 7, 2026
Drinks containing more than 150mg of caffeine per litre will be illegal to sell to children and younger teenagers in shops, restaurants, cafes, vending machines and online.
From BBC ● Jul. 16, 2026
One reader uses an insulated lunch bag with reusable ice packs, along with sodas, so she doesn’t have to pay vending machine prices.
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 7, 2026
“Digital attacks on physical systems create physical problems,” said Gianni Cuozzo, chief executive of Exein, an Italian startup that embeds security software into microchips used in devices from televisions to vending machines and ventilation systems.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 4, 2026
Every so often, she saw a vending machine.
From "Aru Shah and the End of Time" by Roshani Chokshi
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.
