awhile
/əˈwaɪl/
awhile adverb: for some time; for a short time.
Adverb
awhile (not comparable)
- For some time; for a short time.
- Sit with me awhile.
- Take two cupfuls of rolled oats, put in bread pan, turn on four cupfuls of boiling water, stir for awhile.1911, Rufus Estes, Good Things to Eat, as Suggested by Rufus, page 83
- Synonyms:
- for a minute
- In the meantime; during an implicit ongoing process.
- Can I get you a drink awhile?
- Synonyms:
- for the moment, meanwhile, meanwhilst, the while
awhile meaning in Hindi, Urdu, Bengali and Malayalam
awhile in Hindi
- In the meantime; meanwhile
- तब तक tab tak
awhile in Urdu
- ذرا دیر کے لئے
awhile in Bengali
- For some time; for a short time
- কিছুক্ষন kichukkhon
awhile in Malayalam
- അല്പസമയത്തേക്ക്
More languagesFewer languages
- awhile in Indonesian
- sebentar
Examples of awhile in a sentence
- Engine No. 18 went off into a shed to rest awhile, and No. 7, a precisely similar one, backed on to the train in her place.1944 May and June, “When the Circle was Steam Operated”, in Railway Magazine, page 137:
- “Just don’t start up them there stairs yet awhile.”1960 July 11, Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird, Philadelphia, Pa.; New York, N.Y.: J[oshua] B[allinger] Lippincott Company, →OCLC:
- I'll slip beneath these sheets and shiver here awhile / I find this happening more frequently these days1979, The Boomtown Rats, “Wind Chill Factor (Minus Zero)”, in The Fine Art of Surfacing:
Synonyms of awhile
Origin of awhile
From Old English āne (“(for) a”) hwīle (“while”).
Phrases with awhile
Words that rhyme with awhile
48 more rhymesFewer rhymes
- gentile
- kyle
- reptile
- sile
- smile
- Lyle
- tile
- while
- beguile
- bile
- Nile
- spile
- argyll
- enisle
- guile
- gyle
- I'll
- last mile
- nubile
- resile
- restyle
- rile
- senile
- stile
- vile
- autogynephile
- bewile
- chile
- chyle
- Cnile
- District of Argyle
- heil
- ile
- interfile
- isle
- Japanophile
- Kabyle
- kile
- like it's going out of style
- Persophile
- redial
- refile
- revile
- Styal
- thyle
- tickler file
- wile
- worthwhile
Questions about awhile
- What does awhile mean?
- Awhile means for some time; for a short time.
- What is awhile in Hindi?
- Awhile in Hindi is तब तक (tab tak). See Awhile meaning in Hindi.
- How do you use awhile in a sentence?
- Engine No. 18 went off into a shed to rest awhile, and No. 7, a precisely similar one, backed on to the train in her place.
- What part of speech is awhile?
- Awhile is an adverb.
- How do you pronounce awhile?
- Awhile is pronounced /əˈwaɪl/.
Words near awhile in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: awhile (page history and authors); awhile (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); awhile (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.
Last updated:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-awhile.ogg.
Cite this entry: “awhile.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/awhile. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.