get one's own back
get one's own back verb: to avenge oneself.
Verb
get one's own back (third-person singular simple present gets one's own back, present participle getting one's own back, simple past got one's own back, past participle (UK) got one's own back or (US) gotten one's own back)
- To avenge oneself.
- When he spurns her, Julia is outraged to hear it is because she did not measure up to his secret list of 10 bullet-pointed attributes for an ideal bride. To get her own back, she invites her best friend, penniless clergyman’s daughter Selina Dalton (Freida Pinto), up to town to ensnare Malcolm, by...2022 August 24, Peter Bradshaw, “Mr Malcolm’s List review – Regency romcom served with cake-icing of irony”, in The Guardian
- Synonyms:
- avenge, even the score, get back at, retaliate, settle the score, take revenge, tar out
Synonyms of get one's own back
Forms of get one's own back
| third-person singular present | gets one's own back |
|---|---|
| present participle | getting one's own back |
| past | got one's own back |
| past participle UK | got one's own back |
| past participle US | gotten one's own back |
Origin of get one's own back
From get someone's back.
Questions about get one's own back
- What does get one's own back mean?
- Get one's own back means to avenge oneself.
- What part of speech is get one's own back?
- Get one's own back is a verb.
- What is the past tense of get one's own back?
- The past tense of get one's own back is got one's own back.
Words near get one's own back in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: get one's own back (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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