Word.ws English Dictionary

back-pocket

back-pocket verb: to put (something) into a back pocket.

Verb

back-pocket (third-person singular simple present back-pockets, present participle back-pocketing, simple past and past participle back-pocketed)

  1. (transitive) To put (something) into a back pocket.
    • “Right.” He back-pocketed the notebook and lifted the Nikon from my bag. “Take a few steps down the hill and point toward the ruins so I can get both in one shot.”2003, Robert Eversz, Burning Garbo: A Nina Zero Novel, New York, NY: Simon & Schuster, published 2005, →ISBN, page 23
  2. (idiomatic, transitive) To put (something) aside for future use; to keep in reserve.
    • “All the lyrics talk about is humility and heartbreak, and then at the end it’s exuberance and joy,” Hines said. “The only way that fits is if the Caps win the Stanley Cup, so I sort of back-pocketed the idea for years. I put together multiple iterations of it in my head, and it just never panned...2019 June 7, Scott Allen, “How Mumford and Sons became the soundtrack for Capitals’ Stanley Cup triumph”, in The Washington Post

Forms of back-pocket

third-person singular presentback-pockets
present participleback-pocketing
past participleback-pocketed
pastback-pocketed
alternative formbackpocket

Origin of back-pocket

From back pocket.

Questions about back-pocket

What does back-pocket mean?
Back-pocket means to put (something) into a back pocket.
What part of speech is back-pocket?
Back-pocket is a verb.
What is the past tense of back-pocket?
The past tense of back-pocket is back-pocketed.

Words near back-pocket in the dictionary

  1. back-pats
  2. back-patted
  3. back-patting
  4. back-patty
  5. back-pedal
  6. back-pocket
  7. back-pocketed
  8. back-pocketing
  9. back-pockets
  10. back-pressure
  11. back-rank mate

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: back-pocket (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.

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