Word.ws English Dictionary

has-been

UK/ˈhæz.biːn//ˈhæz.bɪn/

has-been noun: a person, especially one who was formerly popular or influential, who continues in their field after their popularity or effectiveness has peaked and is now in decline.

Noun

has-been (plural has-beens)

  1. (derogatory, informal) A person, especially one who was formerly popular or influential, who continues in their field after their popularity or effectiveness has peaked and is now in decline.
    • When the aforesaid alderman or another wishes to express mild contemptuosity for his fellows and himself in future I would suggest “old fossils” or “old has beens,” or “old fogies,” then the Sir Galahads that are always riding—or driving—about in this progressive dorp will not have any cause to...1927 November 25, J. Jingle, “Merely My Musings”, in The Dabbo Liberal and Macquarie Advocate, page 2, column 3
    • I think Apple Computer is a has-been.1986 January 6, John Gantz, “Things Look Better in the Long View”, in InfoWorld, volume 7, number 52, page 19

Adjective

has-been

  1. (derogatory, informal) Of or pertaining to someone or something that was once popular, successful or important but is no longer considered so.

Examples of has-been in a sentence

  • Is it better to never be than to be and eventually become a has-been?2009, William Shatner, Up Till Now: The Autobiography, page 338:
  • They're saying Sonny Hayes isn't a has-been.2025, Ehren Kruger, F1: The Movie, spoken by Kate McKenna (Kerry Condon):

Forms of has-been

pluralhas-beens
alternative formhas been
alternative formhasbeen

Words formed from has-been

Questions about has-been

What does has-been mean?
Has-been means a person, especially one who was formerly popular or influential, who continues in their field after their popularity or effectiveness has peaked and is now in decline.
How do you use has-been in a sentence?
Is it better to never be than to be and eventually become a has-been?
What part of speech is has-been?
Has-been can be a noun or an adjective.
How do you pronounce has-been?
Has-been is pronounced /ˈhæz.biːn/ (UK).
What is the plural of has-been?
The plural of has-been is has-beens.

Words near has-been in the dictionary

  1. has way
  2. has words
  3. has't
  4. has-a
  5. has-as
  6. has-been
  7. has-been-dom
  8. has-beens
  9. Hasaean
  10. Hasaka
  11. Hasaka Province

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: has-been (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-us-has-been.ogg, en-au-has-been.ogg.

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