crash

/ˈkɹæʃ/

crash noun: a sudden, intense, loud sound, as made for example by cymbals. Also the ellipsis of gatecrash.

Noun (1)

crash (plural crashes)

A sudden, intense, loud sound, as made for example by cymbals.
- The piece ended in a crescendo, building up to a crash of cymbals.
- After the lightning came the crash of thunder.
An automobile, airplane, or other vehicle accident.
- She broke two bones in her body in a car crash.
- Nobody survived the plane crash.
A malfunction of computer software or hardware which causes it to shut down or become partially or totally inoperable.
- My computer had a crash so I had to reboot it.
Synonyms:

abend
A sudden large decline in the value of money, stocks or other assets, etc., especially one that causes additional economic difficulties.
- the stock market crash
Synonyms:

meltdown
(informal) A comedown from a drug.
(collective) A group of rhinoceroses.
- One of my favorites among the terms of groups of creatures is a crash of rhinoceros. I can imagine an African guide saying to his client, “Shoot, dammit, shoot! Here comes the whole bloody crash of rhinoceros!”
- […] Personally, I think I’d just as soon come across a crash of rhinoceros as a knot of toad.p. 1991, Patrick F. McManus, “Nincompoopery and Other Group Terms”, in The Grasshopper Trap, Henry Holt and Company, page 103
A sudden decline in any living form's population levels, often leading to extinction.
tarlatan, mull.

Adjective

crash (not comparable)

Quick, fast, intensive, impromptu.
- crash course
- crash diet

Verb

crash (third-person singular simple present crashes, present participle crashing, simple past and past participle crashed)

(intransitive) To collide with something destructively; to fall or come down violently.
- When the car crashed into a house, the driver was heavily injured.
- After driving into a tree last week, grandpa's crashed into a deer this morning.
(transitive) To cause something to collide with something else, especially when this results in damage.
- I'm sorry for crashing the bike into a wall. I'll pay for repairs.
(transitive) To hit or strike with force.
- Roy Hodgson's side were dominant and fully merited the lead given to them when Eric Dier crashed a 20-yard free-kick high past keeper Igor Akinfeev with 17 minutes left.2016 June 11, Phil McNulty, “England 1-1 Russia”, in BBC Sport
- Even the staid New York Times was gushing: “Rising to the glorious heights of his heyday, Babe Ruth, the Sultan of Swat, crashed out three home runs against the Pittsburgh Pirates Saturday afternoon but it was not enough."2022, John Nogowski, Last Time Out: Big-League Farewells of Baseball's Greats, page 8
To make a sudden loud noise.
- Thunder crashed directly overhead.
(transitive) To accelerate a project or a task or its schedule by devoting more resources to it.
- Using the project plan, the team started to work out different scenarios to crash the schedule and bring the date to the regulatory deadline.2008, Rick A. Morris with Brette McWhorter Sember, Project management that works, page 109
(intransitive, slang) To make or experience informal temporary living arrangements, especially overnight.
- Hey dude, can I crash at your pad?
- Then before you know it you’ve missed the last train back and you’re crashing on the sofa.2017, Adam Kay, This Is Going to Hurt: Secret Diaries of a Junior Doctor
(slang, transitive) To give, as a favor.
- 'I been pissin' blood,' he said, grinning. Then frowning. 'Crash us a tenner, eh?'2005, Charlie Williams, Fags and Lager, page 29
- Crash us a cancer stick, Fitz: I could bloody murder a fag, as I delight in telling Americans2014, David Mitchell, The Bone Clocks, →ISBN, page 99
(intransitive, slang) To lie down for a long rest, sleep or nap, as from tiredness or exhaustion.

Synonyms:

doze, repose, rest, saw logs, catch some z's, sleep, sleep a wink, slumber, snooze
(intransitive) To experience a period of depression and/or lethargy after a period of euphoria, as after the euphoric effect of a psychotropic drug has dissipated.
- Falling from cloud nine / Crashing from the high / I'm letting go tonight / Yeah, I'm falling from cloud nine2012, Katy Perry, Max Martin, Bonnie McKee, Dr. Luke, Cirkut, “Wide Awake”, in Teenage Dream: The Complete Confection, performed by Katy Perry
(intransitive, hardware) To terminate or halt execution due to an exception.
- If the system crashes again, we'll have it fixed in the computer shop.
Synonyms:

bomb
(transitive, hardware) To cause an exception that terminates or halts execution.
- Double-clicking this icon crashes the desktop.
To take a sudden and severe turn for the worse; to rapidly and catastrophically deteriorate.
- And the unvarying lesson of history is that all such balance of power peaces have crashed into new conflicts, as soon as the unstable equilibrium was disturbed, witness the Peace of Westphalia, the Congress of Vienna, and, in our own time, Versailles.1945, Mario Pei, The American Road to Peace: A Constitution for the World, page 20
- In October 1929, the United States' stock market crashed, at the end of a buoyant decade in its domestic economy.1994, National Economic Review - Volumes 28-30, page 2
(Scotland, transitive) To take a subject at higher level without having previously studied it.
- Joe's crashing Higher Physics, even after I told him it was a bad idea.

Noun (2)

crash (uncountable)

A type of rough linen.
- The yearly allowance of clothing on this plantation, consisted of two tow-linen shirts—such linen as the coarsest crash towels are made of[…]1855, Frederick Douglass, chapter VI, in My Bondage and My Freedom. […], New York; Auburn, N.Y.: Miller, Orton & Mulligan […], →OCLC
- Unlocking the door of her bath-room she went inside, and soon emerged, bringing a rug, which she spread upon the floor of the gallery, and two huge hair pillows covered with crash, which she placed against the front of the building.1899, Kate Chopin, The Awakening

Also used as

crash is also the ellipsis of gatecrash.

crash meaning in Hindi, Marathi, Bengali and Telugu

crash in Hindi

vehicle accident: टक्कर ṭakkar
computer malfunction: क्रैश kraiś
1. (intransitive) To collide with something destructively; to fall or come down violently.: टकराना ṭakrānā

crash in Marathi

क्रॅश, क्रॅश करण्यासाठी, क्रॅश होण्यासाठी

crash in Telugu

క్రాష్, క్రాష్ చేయడానికి

More languagesFewer languages

crash in Kannada: ಕ್ರ್ಯಾಶ್
crash in Punjabi: ਕਰੈਸ਼, ਕ੍ਰੈਸ਼, ਕਰੈਸ਼ ਕਰਨ ਲਈ
crash in Gujarati: ક્રેશ, ક્રેશ કરવા માટે
crash in Nepali: क्र्यास, क्र्याश, क्र्यास गर्न
crash in Arabic: حَادِث إِصْطِدَام ḥādiṯ ʔiṣṭidām, تَحَطَّمَ taḥaṭṭama, اِنْهِيَار inhiyār, اِنْهِيَار نِظَام inhiyār niẓām
crash in Thai: การชน gaan-chon, ระบบล่ม, ล่ม lôm, ชน chon
crash in Vietnamese: hét, đụng, sự đụng xe, vụ đụng xe

Examples of crash in a sentence

Out in the water a crash of rhinoceros-like animals browse belly deep through a bed of aquatic plants.1999, Edward Osborne Wilson, The Diversity of Life, page 126:
The crash of rhinoceros at Tsavo now numbers almost 200.2003, Claude Herve-Bazin, Judith Farr, Kenya and Tanzania, page 23:
'I don't suppose you could crash me a ciggy, while you're here, could you?'2015, Lucy Diamond, Summer at Shell Cottage, →ISBN:
Despite the quotas determined by fisheries scientists, the Atlantic cod population crashed in the mid-1980s leading to a complete moratorium for fishing the species within Canadian waters.2003, W.M. Roth, Toward an Anthropology of Graphing, page 43:

All 40 example sentences with crash

Synonyms of crash

2 more synonymsFewer synonyms

snooze
bomb

All synonyms of crash

Forms of crash

Noun
plural	crashes
Verb
third-person singular present	crashes
present participle	crashing
past participle	crashed
past	crashed

Past tense of crash: crashed

Plural of crash: crashes

Origin of crash

From Middle English crasshen, crasschen, craschen (“to break into pieces”), of uncertain origin. Perhaps from a variant of earlier *crasken, from crasen (“to break”) + -k (formative suffix); or from earlier *craskien, *craksien, a variant of craken (“to crack, break open”) (for form development compare break, brask, brash).

Uncertain; perhaps compare Russian крашени́на (krašenína, “coarse linen”).

Words formed from crash

Phrases with crash

24 more phrasesFewer phrases

Words that rhyme with crash

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about crash

What does crash mean?: Crash means a sudden, intense, loud sound, as made for example by cymbals.
What is crash in Hindi?: Crash in Hindi is टक्कर (ṭakkar), क्रैश (kraiś), टकराना (ṭakrānā). See Crash meaning in Hindi.
How do you use crash in a sentence?: Out in the water a crash of rhinoceros-like animals browse belly deep through a bed of aquatic plants.
What part of speech is crash?: Crash can be a noun, an adjective or a verb.
How do you pronounce crash?: Crash is pronounced /ˈkɹæʃ/.
What is the plural of crash?: The plural of crash is crashes.

Words near crash in the dictionary

Adapted from Wiktionary: crash (page history and authors); crash (Marathi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); crash (Bengali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); crash (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); crash (Kannada, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); crash (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); crash (Gujarati, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); crash (Nepali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). 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: 2026-09-02

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-us-crash.ogg.

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