need definition | Dictionary.com

need

[need]

–noun

1.	a requirement, necessary duty, or obligation: There is no need for you to go there.

2.	a lack of something wanted or deemed necessary: to fulfill the needs of the assignment.

3.	urgent want, as of something requisite: He has no need of your charity.

4.	necessity arising from the circumstances of a situation or case: There is no need to worry.

5.	a situation or time of difficulty; exigency: to help a friend in need; to be a friend in need.

6.	a condition marked by the lack of something requisite: the need for leadership.

7.	destitution; extreme poverty: The family's need is acute.

–verb (used with object)

8.	to have need of; require: to need money.

–verb (used without object)

9.	to be under an obligation (used as an auxiliary, typically in an interrogative or in a negative statement, and fol. by infinitive, in certain cases without to; in the 3d pers. sing. the form is need, not needs): He need not go.

10.	to be in need or want.

11.	to be necessary: There needs no apology.

—Idiom

12.	if need be, should the necessity arise: If need be, I can type the letters myself.

Origin:
bef. 900; (n.) ME nede, OE nēd (WSaxon nīed), c. G Not, ON nauth, Goth nauths; (v.) ME neden, OE nēodian, deriv. of the n.

Related forms:

needer, noun

Synonyms:
2, 3. See lack. 3. requirement. 4. Need, necessity imply a want, a lack, or a demand, which must be filled. Need, a word of Old English origin, has connotations that make it strong in emotional appeal: the need to be appreciated. Necessity, a word of Latin origin, is more formal and impersonal or objective; though much stronger than need in expressing urgency or imperative demand, it is less effective in appealing to the emotions: Water is a necessity for living things. 5. emergency. 7. neediness, indigence, penury, privation. See poverty. 8. want, lack.

Antonyms:
7. wealth.

Dictionary.com Unabridged
Based on the Random House Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2009.
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Link To need

need (nēd)

A condition or situation in which something is required or wanted: crops in need of water; a need for affection.
Something required or wanted; a requisite: "Those of us who led the charge for these women's issues ... shared a common vision in the needs of women" (Olympia Snowe).
Necessity; obligation: There is no need for you to go.
A condition of poverty or misfortune: The family is in dire need.

v.   need·ed, need·ing, needs

v.   aux.
To be under the necessity of or the obligation to: They need not come.
v.   tr.
To have need of; require: The family needs money. See Synonyms at lack.
v.   intr.

To be in need or want.
To be necessary.

[Middle English nede, from Old English nēod, nēd, distress, necessity.]

Usage Note: Depending on the sense, the verb need behaves sometimes like an auxiliary verb (such as can or may) and sometimes like a main verb (such as want or try). When used as a main verb, need agrees with its subject, takes to before the verb following it, and combines with do in questions, negations, and certain other constructions: He needs to go. Does he need to go so soon? He doesn't need to go. When used as an auxiliary verb, need does not agree with its subject, does not take to before the verb following it, and does not combine with do: He needn't go. Need he go so soon? The auxiliary forms of need are used primarily in present-tense questions, negations, and conditional clauses. Unlike can and may, auxiliary need has no form for the past tense like could and might.

When need is used as the main verb, it can be followed by a present participle, as in The car needs washing, or by to be plus a past participle, as in The car needs to be washed. However, in some areas of the United States, especially western Pennsylvania and eastern Ohio, many speakers omit to be and use just the past participle form, as in The car needs washed. This use of need with past participles is slightly more common in the British Isles, being particularly prevalent in Scotland.

The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition
Copyright © 2009 by Houghton Mifflin Company.
Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.
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Need

Need\, n. [OE. need, neod, nede, AS. ne['a]d, n[=y]d; akin to D. nood, G. not, noth, Icel. nau[eth]r, Sw. & Dan. n["o]d, Goth. naups.]

1. A state that requires supply or relief; pressing occasion for something; necessity; urgent want.

And the city had no need of the sun. --Rev. xxi. 23.

I have no need to beg. --Shak.

Be governed by your needs, not by your fancy. --Jer. Taylor.

2. Want of the means of subsistence; poverty; indigence; destitution. --Chaucer.

Famine is in thy cheeks; Need and oppression starveth in thine eyes. --Shak.

3. That which is needful; anything necessary to be done; (pl.) necessary things; business. [Obs.] --Chaucer.

4. Situation of need; peril; danger. [Obs.] --Chaucer.

Syn: Exigency; emergency; strait; extremity; necessity; distress; destitution; poverty; indigence; want; penury.

Usage: Need, Necessity. Necessity is stronger than need; it places us under positive compulsion. We are frequently under the necessity of going without that of which we stand very greatly in need. It is also with the corresponding adjectives; necessitous circumstances imply the direct pressure of suffering; needy circumstances, the want of aid or relief.

Need

Need\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Needed; p. pr. & vb. n. Needing.] [See Need, n. Cf. AS. n?dan to force, Goth. nau?jan.] To be in want of; to have cause or occasion for; to lack; to require, as supply or relief.

Other creatures all day long Rove idle, unemployed, and less need rest. --Milton.

Note: With another verb, need is used like an auxiliary, generally in a negative sentence expressing requirement or obligation, and in this use it undergoes no change of termination in the third person singular of the present tense. "And the lender need not fear he shall be injured." --Anacharsis (Trans. ).

Need

Need\, v. i. To be wanted; to be necessary. --Chaucer.

When we have done it, we have done all that is in our power, and all that needs. --Locke.

Need

Need\, adv. Of necessity. See Needs. [Obs.] --Chaucer.

Language Translation for : need

Spanish: necesitar,

German: benötigen,

Japanese: ～の必要がある

More Translations »

need (n.)

O.E. nied (W.Saxon), ned (Mercian) "necessity, compulsion, duty," originally "violence, force," from P.Gmc. *nauthis (cf. O.N. nauðr, O.Fris. ned, M.Du. nood, Ger. Not, Goth. nauþs "need"), probably cognate with O.Pruss. nautin "need," and perhaps with O.C.S. nazda, Rus. nuzda, Pol. nedza "misery, distress," from PIE *nau- "death, to be exhausted." The more common O.E. word for "need, necessity, want" was ðearf, but they were connected via a notion of "trouble, pain," and the two formed a compound, niedðearf "need, necessity, compulsion, thing needed." Nied also may have been infl. by O.E. neod "desire, longing," which was often spelled the same. Common in O.E. compounds, e.g. niedfaru "compulsory journey," a euphemism for "death;" niedhæmed "rape," the second element being an O.E. word meaning "sexual intercourse;" niedling "slave." Meaning "extreme poverty, destitution" is from c.1200. The verb is O.E. neodian "be necessary," from the noun. Phrase the needful "money" is attested from 1774. The adj. phrase need-to-know is attested from 1954.

need

In addition to the idiom beginning with need, also see cry for (crying need for)..

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