hourglass
/ˈaʊəɡlɑːs/
hourglass noun: a clock made of two glass vessels connected by a narrow passage through which sand flows.
Noun
hourglass (plural hourglasses)
- A clock made of two glass vessels connected by a narrow passage through which sand flows.
- After each game turn, invert the hourglass to reset the time limit for the next player.
- The sands of thy short life are spent this hour, / And no hand in the universe can turn / Thy hourglass, if these gummed leaves be burnt / Ere thou canst mount up these immortal steps.1819, John Keats, “Canto I”, in The Fall of Hyperion
- Synonyms:
- sandglass, sand timer, watch glass
- A cursor, often shaped like an hourglass, indicating that the computer is busy.
- When I right click the desktop display to check Display Properties, it hangs and shows me only the hourglass instead of the display menu.2002, Maximum PC (Winter 2002, page 16)
- Synonyms:
- egg timer
Verb
hourglass (third-person singular simple present hourglasses, present participle hourglassing, simple past and past participle hourglassed)
- To display the cursor as an hourglass indicating that the computer is busy or processing.
- I have an ADP that I use for reporting that I have used for about a year. I only use it every 3 months, and it has worked up until now. This morning I tried using it, but after trying to open the report, it hourglassed and then showed a "Timeout expired" error. I searched this message and found out...2006 May 5, Drew, “Timeout Expired but worked 3 months ago”, in microsoft.public.access.adp.sqlserver (Usenet)
hourglass meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Urdu and Kannada
hourglass in Hindi
- clock
- रेतघड़ी retghaṛī, बालू घड़ी bālū ghaṛī
hourglass in Tamil
- மணற்கடிகாரம், மணற்கடிகை, வார்த்தைகளுள் ஒன்று
hourglass in Urdu
- clock
- ریت گَھڑی ret ghaṛī
hourglass in Kannada
- ಮರಳು ಗಡಿಯಾರ
More languagesFewer languages
- hourglass in Gujarati
- રેતઘડી retaghḍī
- hourglass in Arabic
- سَاعَةٌ رَمْلِيَّة sāʕatun ramliyya
- hourglass in Malay
- jam pasir
- hourglass in Indonesian
- jam pasir
- hourglass in Thai
- นาฬิกาทราย naa-lí-gaa-saai
- hourglass in Vietnamese
- đồng hồ cát
- hourglass in Myanmar
- သဲနာရီ sai:nari
Synonyms of hourglass
Forms of hourglass
| Noun | |
|---|---|
| plural | hourglasses |
| Verb | |
| third-person singular present | hourglasses |
| present participle | hourglassing |
| past participle | hourglassed |
| past | hourglassed |
Origin of hourglass
From hour + glass.
Words formed from hourglass
Phrases with hourglass
Questions about hourglass
- What does hourglass mean?
- Hourglass means a clock made of two glass vessels connected by a narrow passage through which sand flows.
- What is hourglass in Hindi?
- Hourglass in Hindi is रेतघड़ी (retghaṛī), बालू घड़ी (bālū ghaṛī). See Hourglass meaning in Hindi.
- What part of speech is hourglass?
- Hourglass can be a noun or a verb.
- How do you pronounce hourglass?
- Hourglass is pronounced /ˈaʊəɡlɑːs/.
- What is the plural of hourglass?
- The plural of hourglass is hourglasses.
Words near hourglass in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: hourglass (page history and authors); hourglass (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); hourglass (Kannada Wiktionary) (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: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-hourglass.wav, LL-Q1860 (eng)-Wodencafe-hourglass.wav.
Cite this entry: “hourglass.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/hourglass. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.