- off
- ♦(The preposition is pronounced [[t]ɒf, AM ɔːf[/t]]. The adverb is pronounced [[t]ɒ̱f, AM ɔ͟ːf[/t]])1) PREP If something is taken off something else or moves off it, it is no longer touching that thing.
He took his feet off the desk...
I took the key for the room off a rack above her head...
Hugh wiped the rest of the blood off his face with his handkerchief.
Syn:ADV: ADV after vOff is also an adverb.Lee broke off a small piece of orange and held it out to him... His exhaust fell off six laps from the finish.
2) PREP When you get off a bus, train, or plane, you come out of it or leave it after you have been travelling on it.Don't try to get on or off a moving train!...
As he stepped off the aeroplane, he was shot dead.
Ant:ADV: ADV after vOff is also an adverb.At the next stop the man got off too and introduced himself.
3) PREP If you keep off a street or piece of land, you do not step on it or go there.Locking up men does nothing more than keep them off the streets...
The local police had warned visitors to keep off the beach at night.
ADVOff is also an adverb....a sign saying `Keep Off'.
4) PREP If something is situated off a place such as a coast, room, or road, it is near to it or next to it, but not exactly in it.The boat was anchored off the northern coast of the peninsula...
Lily lives in a penthouse just off Park Avenue...
The Princess's sitting-room leads off the drawing room...
Tiny secluded beaches can be found off the beaten track.
5) ADV: ADV after v, be ADV, oft ADV -ing If you go off, you leave a place.He was just about to drive off when the secretary came running out...
She gave a hurried wave and set off across the grass...
She was off again. Last year she had been to Kenya. This year it was Goa...
When his master's off traveling, Caleb stays with Pierre's parents.
6) ADV: ADV after v Off is used in a number of informal and sometimes offensive phrasal verbs, such as buzz off, clear off, or in British English bugger off, which are used to tell someone angrily to go away.7) ADV: ADV after v When you take off clothing or jewellery that you are wearing, you remove it from your body.He took off his spectacles and rubbed frantically at the lens...
He hastily stripped off his old uniform and began pulling on the new one.
8) ADV: usu n ADV, also be ADV If you have time off or a particular day off, you do not go to work or school, for example because you are ill or it is a day when you do not usually work.The rest of the men had the day off...
You can even snatch a few hours off, and perhaps negotiate the occasional night off too...
She was sacked for demanding Saturdays off...
I'm off tomorrow...
The average Swede was off sick 27 days last year.
Off is also a preposition.He could not get time off work to go on holiday.
9) PREP If you keep off a subject, you deliberately avoid talking about it.Keep off the subject of politics...
Keep the conversation off linguistic matters.
Syn:away from10) ADV: be ADV, ADV after v If something such as an agreement or a sporting event is off, it is cancelled.Until Pointon is completely happy, however, the deal's off...
The vacant W.B.C. junior-lightweight title has been called off...
Greenpeace refused to call off the event.
Syn:cancelled11) PREP If someone is off something harmful such as a drug, they have stopped taking or using it.She felt better and the psychiatrist took her off drug therapy...
Most pregnant women remain off cigarettes while carrying the child.
12) PREP If you are off something, you have stopped liking it.I'm off coffee at the moment...
Diarrhoea can make you feel weak, as well as putting you off your food.
13) ADV: be ADV, ADV after v When something such as a machine or electric light is off, it is not functioning or in use. When you switch it off, you stop it functioning.As he pulled into the driveway, he saw her bedroom light was off...
We used sail power and turned the engine off to save our fuel...
The microphones had been switched off.
Ant:14) PREP: amount PREP n If there is money off something, its price is reduced by the amount specified....Simons Leatherwear, 37 Old Christchurch Road. 20 per cent off all jackets this Saturday.
...discounts offering thousands of pounds off the normal price of a car.
ADV: ADV after v, v-link ADV, amount ADVOff is also an adverb.I'm prepared to knock five hundred pounds off but no more.
15) ADV: n/amount ADV If something is a long way off, it is a long distance away from you.Florida was a long way off.
...animals that from a long way off look like flies...
Below you, though still 50 miles off, is the most treeless stretch of land imaginable.
Syn:16) ADV: n/amount ADV If something is a long time off, it will not happen for a long time.An end to the crisis seems a long way off...
The required technology is probably still two years off.
17) PREP If you get something off someone, you obtain it from them. [SPOKEN]I don't really get a lot of information, and if I do I get it off Mark...
I can't find the boys' shampoo. I can't think where I put it when I took it off them...
`Telmex' was bought off the government by a group of investors.
Syn:18) COMB in ADJ-GRADED Off combines with adverbs such as `well', `badly', and `worse' to form adjectives that indicate how poor or rich someone is.Most of these people aren't very well off...
Surely you can't be that badly off?...
He's very comfortably off.
19) ADJ-GRADED: v-link ADJ If food has gone off, it tastes and smells bad because it is no longer fresh enough to be eaten. [mainly BRIT]Food can be something of a problem. It goes off, and when it's gone off it smells.
Syn:(in AM, usually use spoiled, bad)20) PREP: v PREP n If you live off a particular kind of food, you eat it in order to live. If you live off a particular source of money, you use it to live.Her husband's memories are of living off roast chicken and drinking whisky...
Antony had been living off the sale of his own paintings.
Syn:21) PREP: v PREP n If a machine runs off a particular kind of fuel or power, it uses that power in order to function.The Auto Compact Disc Cleaner can run off batteries or mains.
22) ADJ-GRADED: v-link adv ADJ If you say that someone's behaviour is a bit off, you mean that you find it unacceptable or wrong. [INFORMAL]...coming home with make-up all over his clothes - it's a bit off isn't it...
Some of the dialogue is slightly off.
23) PHRASE: PHR after v, PHR with cl If something happens on and off, or off and on, it happens occasionally, or only for part of a period of time, not in a regular or continuous way.I was still working on and off as a waitress to support myself...
We lived together, off and on, for two years.
Syn:now and again
English dictionary. 2008.
