Word.ws English Dictionary

have one's cake and eat it

have one's cake and eat it is the alternative form of have one's cake and eat it too.

Meaning of have one's cake and eat it too

Verb

have one's cake and eat it too (third-person singular simple present has one's cake and eats it too, present participle having one's cake and eating it too, simple past had one's cake and ate it too, past participle had one's cake and eaten it too)

  1. (idiomatic) To benefit by having two things which are mutually incompatible (such as eating a piece of cake and yet still possessing that piece for future use).
    • It's not possible to get your savings and keep the piggy bank intact. You can't have your cake and eat it too!

Forms of have one's cake and eat it

third-person singular presenthas one's cake and eats it
present participlehaving one's cake and eating it
pasthad one's cake and ate it
past participlehad one's cake and eaten it

Questions about have one's cake and eat it

What is have one's cake and eat it the alternative form of?
Have one's cake and eat it is the alternative form of have one's cake and eat it too.

Words near have one's cake and eat it in the dictionary

  1. have one's act together
  2. have one's ass handed to one
  3. have one's back up
  4. have one's bread buttered for life
  5. have one's bread buttered on both sides
  6. have one's cake and eat it
  7. have one's cake and eat it too
  8. have one's ducks in a row
  9. have one's ears lowered
  10. have one's ears on
  11. have one's ears pinned back

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: have one's cake and eat it (page history and authors); have one's cake and eat it too (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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Cite this entry: “have one's cake and eat it.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/have_one%27s_cake_and_eat_it. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.