Word.ws English Dictionary

kicking ass

kicking ass is the present participle and gerund of kick ass.

Meaning of kick ass

Verb

kick ass (third-person singular simple present kicks ass, present participle kicking ass, simple past and past participle kicked ass)

  1. (Canada, US, colloquial, idiomatic, vulgar) To win decisively.
    • Did you win? We didn't just win, we kicked ass.
    Synonyms:
    kick butt
  2. (Canada, US, colloquial, idiomatic, stative, vulgar) To be very impressive.
    • The soundtrack to this film really kicks ass!
  3. (ambitransitive, informal, vulgar) To beat to a pulp; beat up
    • I have come here to chew bubblegum and kick ass. And I'm all out of bubblegum.1988, Roddy Piper, “John Nada”, in They Live

See all 4 meanings of kick ass

Questions about kicking ass

What is kicking ass the present participle and gerund of?
Kicking ass is the present participle and gerund of kick ass.

Words near kicking ass in the dictionary

  1. kicking against
  2. kicking against the pricks
  3. kicking and screaming
  4. kicking around
  5. kicking arse
  6. kicking ass
  7. kicking ass and taking names
  8. kicking at an open door
  9. kicking at the can
  10. kicking back
  11. kicking boots

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: kicking ass (page history and authors); kick ass (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: “kicking ass.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/kicking_ass. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.