Word.ws English Dictionary

headhunt

US/ˈhɛdˌhʌnt/

headhunt verb: to cut off, and preserve, the heads of one's enemies.

Verb

headhunt (third-person singular simple present headhunts, present participle headhunting, simple past and past participle headhunted)

  1. (transitive) To cut off, and preserve, the heads of one's enemies.
  2. (intransitive) To actively recruit executive personnel.
  3. (intransitive) To pitch at a batter's head.
    • There's a brawl on the field because the pitcher has been headhunting throughout the game.
  4. (transitive) To use one's hockey stick to strike an opponent's head.

Forms of headhunt

third-person singular presentheadhunts
present participleheadhunting
past participleheadhunted
pastheadhunted
alternative formhead-hunt

Origin of headhunt

Back-formation from headhunter.

Words formed from headhunt

Questions about headhunt

What does headhunt mean?
Headhunt means to cut off, and preserve, the heads of one's enemies.
What part of speech is headhunt?
Headhunt is a verb.
How do you pronounce headhunt?
Headhunt is pronounced /ˈhɛdˌhʌnt/ (US).
What is the past tense of headhunt?
The past tense of headhunt is headhunted.

Words near headhunt in the dictionary

  1. headhairs
  2. headhigh
  3. headhood
  4. headhouse
  5. headhouses
  6. headhunt
  7. headhunted
  8. headhunter
  9. headhunters
  10. headhunting
  11. headhuntings

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: headhunt (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: “headhunt.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/headhunt. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.