Word.ws English Dictionary

holding the cards

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

Meaning of hold the cards

Verb

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

  1. (idiomatic) To be in a strong position, possessing significant advantages over someone else; to be in control of a situation involving multiple parties.
    • "[B]ut if you make conditions I have no choice but to accept them, seeing that you hold the cards."1907, R. Austin Freeman, chapter 14, in The Red Thumb Mark

Questions about holding the cards

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

Words near holding the cards in the dictionary

  1. holding tanks
  2. holding that thought
  3. holding the aces
  4. holding the ball
  5. holding the book
  6. holding the cards
  7. holding the floor
  8. holding the line
  9. holding the phone
  10. holding the purse strings
  11. holding the reins

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: holding the cards (page history and authors); hold the cards (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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