eats

verb (used with object)

to take into the mouth and swallow for nourishment; chew and swallow (food).

to consume by or as if by devouring gradually; wear away; corrode: The patient was eaten by disease and pain.

to make (a hole, passage, etc.), as by gnawing or corrosion.

to ravage or devastate: a forest eaten by fire.

to use up, especially wastefully; consume (often followed by up ): Unexpected expenses have been eating up their savings.

to absorb or pay for: The builder had to eat the cost of the repairs.

Slang: Vulgar. to perform cunnilingus or fellatio on.

Relevant Questions

verb (used without object)

to consume food; take a meal: We'll eat at six o'clock.

to make a way, as by gnawing or corrosion: Acid ate through the linoleum.

00:10

Eats is always a great word to know.

So is bezoar. Does it mean:

a children's mummer's parade, as on the Fourth of July, with prizes for the best costumes.

a calculus or concretion found in the stomach or intestines of certain animals, esp. ruminants, formerly reputed to be an effective remedy for poison.

LEARN MORE UNUSUAL WORDS WITH WORD DYNAMO...

noun

10.

eats, Informal. food.

Verb phrases

11.

eat awayinto, to destroy gradually, as by erosion: For eons, the pounding waves ate away at the shoreline.

12.

eat out, to have a meal at a restaurant rather than at home.

13.

eat up,

to consume wholly.

to show enthusiasm for; take pleasure in: The audience ate up everything he said.

to believe without question.

Idioms

14.

be eating someone, Informal. to worry, annoy, or bother: Something seems to be eating him—he's been wearing a frown all day.

15.

eat crow. crow¹ ( def 7 ).

16.

eat high off the hog. hog ( def 16 ).

17.

eat humble pie. humble pie ( def 3 ).

18.

eat in, to eat or dine at home.

19.

eat one's heart out. heart ( def 26 ).

20.

eat one's terms. term ( def 17 ).

21.

eat one's words. word ( def 16 ).

22.

eat out of one's hand. hand ( def 49 ).

23.

eat someone out of house and home, to eat so much as to strain someone's resources of food or money: A group of hungry teenagers can eat you out of house and home.

24.

eat someone's lunch, Slang. to thoroughly defeat, outdo, injure, etc.

25.

eat the wind out of, Nautical. to blanket (a sailing vessel sailing close-hauled) by sailing close on the weather side of.

Origin:
before 900; Middle English eten, Old English etan; cognate with German essen, Gothic itan, Latin edere

Related forms

eat·er, noun

out·eat, verb (used with object), out·ate, out·eat·en, out·eat·ing.

un·der·eat, verb (used without object), un·der·ate, un·der·eat·en, un·der·eat·ing.

Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2013.
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Link To eats

Collins

World English Dictionary

eat (iːt)

—vb (often foll by into or through) , eats, eating, ate, eaten
1.	to take into the mouth and swallow (food, etc), esp after biting and chewing
2.	(tr; often foll by away or up) to destroy as if by eating: the damp had eaten away the woodwork
3.	(often foll by into) to use up or waste: taxes ate into his inheritance
4.	to make (a hole, passage, etc) by eating or gnawing: rats ate through the floor
5.	to take or have (a meal or meals): we always eat at six
6.	(tr) to include as part of one's diet: he doesn't eat fish
7.	informal (tr) to cause to worry; make anxious: what's eating you?
8.	slang (tr) to perform cunnilingus or fellatio upon
9.	informal I'll eat my hat if I will be greatly surprised if (something happens that proves me wrong)
10.	eat one's heart out to brood or pine with grief or longing
11.	eat one's words to take back something said; recant; retract
12.	eat out of someone's hand to be entirely obedient to someone
13.	eat someone out of house and home to ruin someone, esp one's parent or one's host, by consuming all his food

[Old English etan; related to Gothic itan, Old High German ezzan, Latin edere, Greek edein, Sanskrit admi]

'eater

—n

EAT or EAZ

—*abbreviation for*
	Tanzania (international car registration)

[from E(ast) A(frica) T(anganyika) or E(ast) A(frica) Z(anzibar)]

EAZ or EAZ

—*abbreviation for*

[from E(ast) A(frica) T(anganyika) or E(ast) A(frica) Z(anzibar)]

eats (iːts)

—*pl n*
	informal articles of food; provisions

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 10th Edition
2009 © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins
Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009
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Etymonline

Word Origin & History

eat

O.E. etan (class V strong verb; past tense æt, pp. eten), from P.Gmc. *etanan (cf. O.N. eta, Goth. itan, Ger. essen), from PIE base *ed- "to eat" (see edible). Transferred sense of "slow, gradual corrosion or destruction" is from 1550s. Meaning "to preoccupy, engross"

(as in what's eating you?) first recorded 1893. Slang sexual sense of "do cunnilingus on" is first recorded 1927. Eat out "dine away from home" is from 1933. The slang phrase to eat one's words is from 1570s; to eat one's heart out is from 1590s; for eat one's hat, see hat.

eats

"food," in use mid-19c. in U.S., considered colloquial, but the same construction with the same meaning was present in O.E.

American Heritage

Medical Dictionary

eat (ēt)
v. ate (āt), eat·en (ēt'n), eat·ing, eats

To take into the body by the mouth for digestion or absorption.
To consume, ravage, or destroy by or as if by ingesting, such as by a disease.

Slang Dictionary

eat definition

tv.
[for something] to bother or worry someone. : Nothing's eating me. I'm just the nervous type.
tv.
to absorb the cost or expense of something. : We'll eat the costs on this one. It's the least we can do.
tv.
to perform oral sex on someone. (Usually objectionable.) : She said she wanted to eat me!

Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions by Richard A. Spears.Fourth Edition.
Copyright 2007. Published by McGraw Hill.
Cite This Source

eat (one's) definition

tv.
to suffer from sorrow or grief. : Don't eat your heart out. You really didn't like him that much, did you?
tv.
to suffer from envy or jealousy. (Usually a command.) : Yeah, this one's all mine. Eat your heart out!

Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions by Richard A. Spears.Fourth Edition.
Copyright 2007. Published by McGraw Hill.
Cite This Source

eat (sth) definition

tv.
to consume something rapidly, such as food or money. : Running this household eats my income up.
tv.
to believe something. : Those people really eat that stuff up about tax reduction.
tv.
to appreciate something. : The stuff about the federal budget went over well. They really ate up the whole story.

Dictionary of American Slang and Colloquial Expressions by Richard A. Spears.Fourth Edition.
Copyright 2007. Published by McGraw Hill.
Cite This Source

American Heritage

Abbreviations & Acronyms

EAT

earnings after taxes
Tanzania (international vehicle ID)

Example sentences from the web

He was the only one armed, though, and kills and eats the others.

From this comes the common saying that the sea squirt eats its own brain.

Many of the clear containers used in the show good eats are lexan containers.

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Dagwood sandwich eating glutton gutser hippophagist ichthyophagist

Matching Quote

"He swore he would never marry, and yet now, in despite of his heart, he eats his meat without grudging; and how you may be converted I know not, but methinks you look with your eyes as other women do."

-Shakespeare