Word.ws English Dictionary

dead or alive

dead or alive adjective: either dead or alive.

Adjective

dead or alive (not comparable)

  1. Either dead or alive.
  2. Used to indicate someone is being sought for some kind of punishment or reprimand, and that (s)he may be killed in the process of finding, as if this was reasonable punishment.
    • Wanted: dead or alive.

dead or alive meaning in Arabic

dead or alive in Arabic

wanted poster term
حَيّ أَوْ مَيِّت ḥayy ʔaw mayyit

Origin of dead or alive

From usage in wanted posters in the 19th century American West and, especially in popular drama about the American West in that period.

Words formed from dead or alive

  • wanted dead or alive

Questions about dead or alive

What does dead or alive mean?
Dead or alive means either dead or alive.
What is dead or alive in Arabic?
Dead or alive in Arabic is حَيّ أَوْ مَيِّت (ḥayy ʔaw mayyit). See Dead or alive meaning in Arabic.
What part of speech is dead or alive?
Dead or alive is an adjective.

Words near dead or alive in the dictionary

  1. dead oils
  2. dead on
  3. dead on arrival
  4. dead on one's feet
  5. dead on the vine
  6. dead or alive
  7. dead pan
  8. dead panned
  9. dead panning
  10. dead pans
  11. dead people walking

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: dead or alive (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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