Word.ws English Dictionary

cling on

cling on verb: to hold on tightly; to grip hard or adhere.

Verb

cling on (third-person singular simple present clings on, present participle clinging on, simple past and past participle clung on)

  1. (figuratively, sometimes) To hold on tightly; to grip hard or adhere.
    • And although they were pushed harder than even Lennon might have expected on a night of galeforce winds, they clung on to the lead Ledley gave them for all they were worth until their rivals had blown themselves out and surrendered top spot.2011 December 29, Keith Jackson, “SPL: Celtic 1 Rangers 0”, in Daily Record
    • In a summation of changed times, we have a lost station site in Bournemouth (now occupied by a coach park) as well as its former hotel (still clinging on as apartments).2021 December 29, Stephen Roberts, “Stories and facts behind railway plaques: Bournemouth (circa 1880)”, in RAIL, number 947, page 59

Forms of cling on

third-person singular presentclings on
present participleclinging on
past participleclung on
pastclung on

Words formed from cling on

Questions about cling on

What does cling on mean?
Cling on means to hold on tightly; to grip hard or adhere.
What part of speech is cling on?
Cling on is a verb.
What is the past tense of cling on?
The past tense of cling on is clung on.

Words near cling on in the dictionary

  1. clinemetrics
  2. clines
  3. cling
  4. cling film
  5. cling films
  6. cling on
  7. cling peach
  8. cling peaches
  9. cling to
  10. cling to the skirts of
  11. cling wrap

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: cling on (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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Cite this entry: “cling on.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/cling_on. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.