Word.ws English Dictionary

holding off

holding off is the present participle and gerund of hold off.

Meaning of hold off

Verb

hold off (third-person singular simple present holds off, present participle holding off, simple past and past participle held off)

  1. (idiomatic, transitive) To delay (someone or something) temporarily; to keep at bay.
    • Let's try to hold off the lawyers until we are ready for them.
  2. (idiomatic, intransitive, transitive) To delay commencing (an action until some specified time or event has passed).
    • Hold off (on) the decision one more day so I can answer your question.

Questions about holding off

What is holding off the present participle and gerund of?
Holding off is the present participle and gerund of hold off.

Words near holding off in the dictionary

  1. holding it together
  2. holding midfielder
  3. holding midfielders
  4. holding note
  5. holding notes
  6. holding off
  7. holding on
  8. holding one's alcohol
  9. holding one's drink
  10. holding one's fire
  11. holding one's head high

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: holding off (page history and authors); hold off (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: “holding off.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/holding_off. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.