Word.ws English Dictionary

have one's way

have one's way verb: to obtain the circumstances one wishes for; to do what one wishes to do, or to have others do what one wishes them to do.

Verb

have one's way (third-person singular simple present has one's way, present participle having one's way, simple past and past participle had one's way)

  1. (idiomatic) To obtain the circumstances one wishes for; to do what one wishes to do, or to have others do what one wishes them to do.
    Synonyms:
    get one's way
  2. (idiomatic) To achieve a desired or natural result.
    • He held out to me a bowl of steaming broth, that filled the room with a savour sweeter, ten thousand times, to me than every rose and lily of the world; yet would not let me drink it at a gulp, but made me sip it with a spoon like any baby. […] And so it was ten days or more before youth and health...[1898], J[ohn] Meade Falkner, “In the Vault”, in Moonfleet, London; Toronto, Ont.: Jonathan Cape, published 1934, →OCLC, pages 62–63
  3. (euphemistic) To have sexual intercourse with, especially without the consent of one's partner.

Synonyms of have one's way

Forms of have one's way

third-person singular presenthas one's way
present participlehaving one's way
past participlehad one's way
pasthad one's way

Words formed from have one's way

Questions about have one's way

What does have one's way mean?
Have one's way means to obtain the circumstances one wishes for; to do what one wishes to do, or to have others do what one wishes them to do.
What part of speech is have one's way?
Have one's way is a verb.
What is the past tense of have one's way?
The past tense of have one's way is had one's way.

Words near have one's way in the dictionary

  1. have one's pick
  2. have one's pockets on swole
  3. have one's shit together
  4. have one's tail up
  5. have one's tubes tied
  6. have one's way
  7. have one's way with
  8. have one's Weetabix
  9. have one's whole life ahead of one
  10. have one's wicked way with
  11. have one's wig snatched

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: have one's way (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-have one's way.ogg.

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