Word.ws English Dictionary

force of habit

force of habit noun: an act that has been repeated to the point where the performance of the act becomes automatic.

Noun

force of habit (countable and uncountable, plural forces of habit)

  1. (idiomatic) An act that has been repeated to the point where the performance of the act becomes automatic.
    • "Only force of habit will explain why people today do honor to Christopher Columbus." - New York Times, 1937
    • The Tin Woodman lay down on his bed from force of habit, for he remembered when he was made of flesh; but not being able to sleep, he passed the night moving his joints up and down to make sure they kept in good working order.1900 May 17, L[yman] Frank Baum, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, Chicago, Ill.; New York, N.Y.: Geo[rge] M[elvin] Hill Co., →OCLC

Forms of force of habit

pluralforces of habit

Questions about force of habit

What does force of habit mean?
Force of habit means an act that has been repeated to the point where the performance of the act becomes automatic.
What part of speech is force of habit?
Force of habit is a noun.
What is the plural of force of habit?
The plural of force of habit is forces of habit.

Words near force of habit in the dictionary

  1. force in
  2. force justified
  3. force majeure
  4. force multiplier
  5. force multipliers
  6. force of habit
  7. force of nature
  8. force of will
  9. force one's way
  10. force out
  11. force outs

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: force of habit (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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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-au-force of habit.ogg.

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