war
noun
a conflict carried on by force of arms, as between nations or between parties within a nation; warfare, as by land, sea, or air.
war
1 American
[wawr]
/ wɔr /
noun
-
wars
plural
-
a conflict carried on by force of arms, as between nations or between parties within a nation; warfare, as by land, sea, or air.
-
a state or period of armed hostility or active military operations.
The two nations were at war with each other.
-
a contest carried on by force of arms, as in a series of battles or campaigns.
the War of 1812.
-
armed fighting, as a science, profession, activity, or art; methods or principles of waging armed conflict.
War is the soldier's business.
-
active hostility or contention; conflict; contest.
a war of words.
-
aggressive business conflict, as through severe price cutting in the same industry or any other means of undermining competitors.
a fare war among airlines; a trade war between nations.
-
a struggle to achieve a goal.
the war on cancer;
a war against poverty;
a war for hearts and minds.
-
Cards.
-
a game for two or more persons, played with a 52-card pack evenly divided between the players, in which each player turns up one card at a time with the higher card taking the lower, and in which, when both turned up cards match, each player lays one card face down and turns up another, the player with the higher card of the second turn taking all the cards laid down.
-
an occasion in this game when both turned up cards match.
-
-
Archaic. a battle.
verb (used without object)
-
wars,
present (3rd person singular)
-
warred,
past participle, past
-
warring
present participle
-
to make or carry on war; fight.
to war with a neighboring nation.
-
to carry on active hostility or contention.
Throughout her life she warred with sin and corruption.
-
to be in conflict or in a state of strong opposition.
The temptation warred with his conscience.
adjective
war
2
American
[wahr]
/ wɑr /
adjective
Scot. and North England.
war.
3
American
abbreviation
war
1
British
/ wɔː /
noun
-
open armed conflict between two or more parties, nations, or states
-
a particular armed conflict
the 1973 war in the Middle East
-
the techniques of armed conflict as a study, science, or profession
-
any conflict or contest
a war of wits
the war against crime
-
(modifier) of, relating to, resulting from, or characteristic of war
a war hero
war damage
a war story
-
to have made the most of the opportunities presented to one during wartime
-
informal (esp of a child) hurt or knocked about, esp as a result of quarrelling and fighting
verb
War.
2
British
abbreviation
war
Idioms
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
warsimple
-
warssimple
-
have warredperfect
-
has warredperfect
-
am warringprogressive
-
are warringprogressive
-
is warringprogressive
-
have been warringperfect progressive
-
has been warringperfect progressive
Past
-
warredsimple
-
had warredperfect
-
was warringprogressive
-
were warringprogressive
-
had been warringperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of war1
First recorded before 1150; Middle English noun wer(re), war(re), late Old English werre, wyrre, from Old North French wer(r)e, waire, from Old Frankish werra (unrecorded), from Germanic; cognate with Old High German werra, Middle Low German, Middle Dutch werre “strife, discord”; verb derivative of the noun; akin to war 2, worse
Origin of war2
First recorded in 1300–50; Middle English wer(re), war(re), from Old Norse verri worse
Explanation
War is armed combat between two or more countries or between different groups of people within the same country. As the soul singer Edwin Starr asked, "War! Huh! What is it good for?" Absolutely nothing. The term "civil war" means not that the war is courteous and polite, but that it is between citizens of the same nation or community, as in the American Civil War. Often war refers to nonmilitary combat or tension, such as between angry neighbors, or rival sports teams, or between different social classes — as in "class war," or government policies such as the "war on drugs."
Vocabulary lists containing war
Memorial Day: Words of Respect and Remembrance
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Part 1 Vocabulary (Unit 1)
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Gather Vocabulary Knowledge, Unit 1
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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:
The New York City Council is investigating four prediction markets for alleged deceptive marketing practices and targeting minors, opening a new front in the bitter, state-by-state legal war over prediction-market regulation.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 12, 2026
The soldiers are to be buried at the German war cemetery in Budaörs, just outside the Hungarian capital.
From BBC ● Aug. 12, 2026
He speculates that tariffs and inflation related to the war in Iran have played major roles in increasing travel expenses from $50,000 to at least $60,000 in one year.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 12, 2026
TUI had issued a profit warning in April, weeks after the Mideast war forced it to repatriate 10,000 travellers, including 5,000 people stuck on two cruise ships in the Gulf.
From Barron's ● Aug. 12, 2026
Tell the truth before it’s too late, the voice said, and then the war ended, and now everyone is coming home.
From "The Brightwood Code" by Monica Hesse
“Jordan is not a party to this war. Its people should not have to bear the consequences or pay the price for policies that do not serve the nation’s supreme interests,” the letter said.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 28, 2026
"He just doesn't want to end the war. I think that many in the world were disappointed by this answer," he wrote on Telegram.
From BBC ● Jun. 5, 2026
"Do not be afraid to take the path out of this war. That is the main thing that is required of you now," he implored.
From BBC ● Jun. 4, 2026
“You got us into a war. You didn’t consult us. You didn’t listen to us. Nothing,” he said.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 4, 2026
“A number of children came to us during those awful years leading up to the war. There was so much upheaval.”
From "Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children" by Ransom Riggs
“This was done right after the Civil War. This was for the babies of slaves,” Trump said.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 7, 2026
He went on: “I mean, I knew he didn’t know who Bismarck was, or about the Franco-Prussian War. I said, ‘Do you mean the kaiser’s generals?
From Salon ● Oct. 23, 2024
“We saw that everything is possible. We saw that you can negotiate during a war, or a Cold War. You can negotiate with people you name terrorist, or dictator.”
From BBC ● Sep. 11, 2024
Civil War. 750,000 soldiers died in that war, according to recently revised estimates, and that's not including the tens of thousands of civilian casualties and the untold numbers of the injured.
From Scientific American ● Nov. 2, 2023
“He been to war, Junior. War. Do you know what that is? Stop rushing him out the door so you can bring little Miss Cute Gal in here.”
From "P.S. Be Eleven" by Rita Williams-Garcia
Bidding wars are pushing some prices into the five-figure range.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 10, 2026
"Even wars have rules. One of those is that health must be protected!"
From Barron's ● Aug. 9, 2026
For 58 seasons, through wars, impeachments and the corporate dismantling of the network news business around it, “60 Minutes” remained America’s highest-rated newsmagazine.
From Salon ● Aug. 8, 2026
And amid the ongoing fast-food discount wars, analysts note that Wendy’s value menu has perhaps gotten too complex.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 8, 2026
These campaigns were called the Crusades and were framed as religious wars between Christianity and Islam.
From "An Indigenous People’s History of the United States" by Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz
In his first term, he warred incessantly with public sector unions.
From Slate ● Mar. 12, 2025
Then, two titanic egos — Times publisher Harrison Gray Otis and railroad baron Henry Huntington — warred through their proxies in Congress, Huntington wanting the harbor in Santa Monica, and Otis in San Pedro.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 13, 2023
U.S. oil prices hit their lowest this year overnight as concerns over Chinese demand warred with talk of possible OPEC+ output cuts.
From Reuters ● Nov. 29, 2022
Cities warred on one another for territory, captives, and riches, but they rarely succeeded in conquering other cities outright.
From Textbooks ● Jan. 1, 2020
Long before apartheid existed these tribal factions clashed and warred with one another.
From "Born a Crime: Stories from a South African Childhood" by Trevor Noah
His people are ancient and few, a clan whose kinship with nature left them vulnerable to warring nobles who all but wiped them out.
From Salon ● Jul. 22, 2026
The move ramps up a conflict between warring factions in Silicon Valley over how to regulate the transformative technology.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 22, 2026
An initial deal between the warring sides announced by Pakistan this week has come too late for this mango season, which began in June in southern Sindh province.
From Barron's ● Jun. 21, 2026
However, since those first few weeks of the conflict, risk assets have rallied powerfully in expectation of some kind of negotiated compromise between the warring parties and a reopening of the Strait of Hormuz.
From MarketWatch ● May 18, 2026
Nailer looked back at his father, conflicted emotions warring within him.
From "Ship Breaker" by Paolo Bacigalupi
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.
