Word.ws English Dictionary

having to

having to is the present participle and gerund of have to.

Meaning of have to

Verb

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

  1. Must; need to; to be urged to; to be required to; indicates obligation.
    • You have to wear a seat belt.
  2. Must; expresses a logical conclusion.
    • that has to be the postman; it has to be an electrical fault
    Synonyms:
    be bound to, have got to, got to, gotta, must

Questions about having to

What is having to the present participle and gerund of?
Having to is the present participle and gerund of have to.

Words near having to in the dictionary

  1. having the world on a string
  2. having tickets on oneself
  3. having time
  4. having time on one's hands
  5. having time on one's side
  6. having to
  7. having to say for oneself
  8. having truck with
  9. having up
  10. having Van Gogh's ear for music
  11. having way

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: having to (page history and authors); have to (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: “having to.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/having_to. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.