Word.ws English Dictionary

have a care

have a care verb: take care; be on one's guard.

Verb

have a care (third-person singular simple present has a care, present participle having a care, simple past and past participle had a care)

  1. (dated, imperative) take care; be on one's guard
    • "If I don't have a care," reflected Lady Bell in alarm, and with the crude unmincing expression of opinion which belonged to her years and her generation, "I'll soon be as great a brute as Trevor."1874, Sarah Tytler, Lady Bell: A Story of the Last Century, page 82

Forms of have a care

third-person singular presenthas a care
present participlehaving a care
past participlehad a care
pasthad a care

Questions about have a care

What does have a care mean?
Have a care means take care; be on one's guard.
What part of speech is have a care?
Have a care is a verb.
What is the past tense of have a care?
The past tense of have a care is had a care.

Words near have a care in the dictionary

  1. have a blessed one
  2. have a bone in one's leg
  3. have a bone to pick
  4. have a brick in one's hat
  5. have a bun in the oven
  6. have a care
  7. have a clue
  8. have a cob on
  9. have a couple
  10. have a cow
  11. have a crack at

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: have a care (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-have a care.oga.

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