Showing results for "waiting"

• present participle of wait.

waiting

American  

[way-ting] / ˈweɪ tɪŋ /

noun

1. a period of waiting; pause, interval, or delay.

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adjective

1. serving or being in attendance.

   waiting man;

   waiting maid;

   waiting woman.

idioms

1. in waiting, in attendance, as upon a royal personage.

Other Word Forms

• waitingly
  adverb

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Etymology

Origin of waiting

First recorded in 1150–1200; Middle English (noun); see wait, -ing ¹, -ing ²

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Explanation

The act of standing by without acting as you anticipate a future event or time is waiting. Waiting can be agonizing, especially waiting for something vitally important, like election results — or your birthday. The word waiting is a noun used for a kind of action that's characterized by inaction or delay: "Generations of waiting produced no change in a city's discriminatory policies, so citizens planned a protest march." It's also a useful adjective, for things like waiting rooms, waiting lists, and waiting periods. In the old days the word was also used for certain servants, lords or ladies "in waiting" who waited on their employers.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

waiting

Since then, Domínguez said she has just been waiting on the citizenship ceremony, “but it never came through.”

From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 20, 2026

Meanwhile, investors are still waiting for the initial public offerings of frontier model makers Anthropic and OpenAI.

From MarketWatch ● Oct. 20, 2026

Fewer hospital beds can jam up emergency departments with patients—some who grow irate waiting for beds.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 20, 2026

Rob Wassell, 58, has been waiting almost two years for the lump sum from his brother's civil service pension, following his death.

From BBC ● Oct. 19, 2026

I do not know how long we stood there in the hallway, waiting, but it seemed like a lifetime.

From "An Elephant in the Garden" by Michael Morpurgo

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