Word.ws English Dictionary

buy some time

buy some time is the alternative form of buy time.

Meaning of buy time

Verb

buy time (third-person singular simple present buys time, present participle buying time, simple past and past participle bought time)

  1. (idiomatic) To purposefully cause a delay, in order to achieve something else.
    • We need you to buy us some time, so distract the security guard for a few minutes.

Forms of buy some time

third-person singular presentbuys some time
present participlebuying some time
past participlebought some time
pastbought some time

Questions about buy some time

What is buy some time the alternative form of?
Buy some time is the alternative form of buy time.

Words near buy some time in the dictionary

  1. buy out
  2. buy out from under
  3. buy over
  4. buy side
  5. buy sides
  6. buy some time
  7. buy stop order
  8. buy stop orders
  9. buy straw hats in winter
  10. buy the big one
  11. buy the dip

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: buy some time (page history and authors); buy time (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:

Cite this entry: “buy some time.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/buy_some_time. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.