Word.ws English Dictionary

high-octane

high-octane adjective: of fuel, having a high octane number, good antiknock characteristics; used in high-performance vehicles.

Adjective

high-octane (comparative higher-octane, superlative highest-octane)

  1. Of fuel, having a high octane number, good antiknock characteristics; used in high-performance vehicles.
    • Now, to do the job, I need some high-octane gasoline.1982, Terry Hayes, George Miller, Mad Max 2: The Road Warrior, spoken by Max (Mel Gibson)
    Antonyms:
    low-octane
  2. (broadly, figuratively) High-powered, energetic, forceful or dynamic.
    • So what if the Greeks never had BMX bikes? This year's Olympic Games, which kick off August 8 in China, add high-octane competitions—BMX racing and open-water swimming—and include sports like table tennis taken to Olympian levels.2008 January–February, Matt Bean, “Your cultural calendar: 7 things to look forward to this year”, in Men's Health, volume 23, number 1, →ISSN, page 135
    • Will the exponential growth in TV rights income at home and abroad that has fuelled the endless inflation of the Premier League’s high-octane balloon ever level off?2016 October 24, Owen Gibson, “Is the unthinkable happening – are people finally switching the football off?”, in The Guardian, London, archived from the original on 04 Jun 2023
    Antonyms:
    low-octane
  3. (figuratively) Of a drink, highly intoxicating or caffeinated.
    • There's no question that the high-octane beers of Marshall Wharf have had a massive influence on the breweries that have opened in Maine since 2007.2013, Josh Christie, Maine Beer: Brewing in Vacationland, Arcadia Publishing, →ISBN

Antonyms of high-octane

Forms of high-octane

comparativehigher-octane
superlativehighest-octane

Origin of high-octane

From high + octane. First use appears c. 1931 in the Oakland Tribune.

Questions about high-octane

What does high-octane mean?
High-octane means of fuel, having a high octane number, good antiknock characteristics; used in high-performance vehicles.
What part of speech is high-octane?
High-octane is an adjective.

Words near high-octane in the dictionary

  1. high-nosed
  2. high-occupancy vehicle
  3. high-occupancy vehicle lane
  4. high-occupancy vehicle lanes
  5. high-occupancy vehicles
  6. high-octane
  7. high-paid
  8. high-pass
  9. high-passes
  10. high-paying
  11. high-performance

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: high-octane (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.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-us-high-octane.oga.

Cite this entry: “high-octane.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/high-octane. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.