Word.ws English Dictionary

preempt

/ˌpɹiːˈɛmpt/

preempt verb: to appropriate first.

Verb

preempt (third-person singular simple present preempts, present participle preempting, simple past and past participle preempted)

  1. (transitive) To appropriate first.
    • He preempted that hill to be its king.
    • When they have preempted their ground [=their particular teat] they want to keep it, so you often see a fight, but see that there is only one claim made and then the old sow will not be disturbed. When once ranged they will always seek the same place.1913, R. L. Hill, Brood Sows and Their Litters: A Practical Book on how to Handle the Brood Sow and Her Litter. What to Feed, when to Feed and how to Feed. Also how to Care for the Litter, page 66
  2. (transitive) To displace or take the place of (by having higher precedence, etc).
    • Floppy disks were preempted by CDs.
    • Similarly, in order to realize fully the benefits to consumers of increased competition in telecommunications, the Administration proposes to preempt state entry regulation for provision of telecommunications and information services.1993, United States. Congress. House. Committee on Energy and Commerce. Subcommittee on Telecommunications and Finance, National Communications Infrastructure, page 173
  3. (transitive) To prevent or beat to the punch, to forestall an expected occurrence by acting first.
    • By his statement, the Secretary-General had effectively preempted the usual frustrating debates over questions of fact and law.1985, Thomas M. Franck, Nation Against Nation: What Happened to the U.N. Dream and What the U.S. Can Do About It, Oxford University Press, →ISBN, page 35
    • But when it came time to hear from Charest on the evening of the razor-thin federalist victory, Jean Chretien deliberately preempted his appearance on national television.2009, Robert E. Plamondon, Blue thunder, page 372
    Synonyms:
    ninja
  4. (transitive) To secure (land, etc.) by the right of preemption (purchasing before others, e.g. land because one already occupies it).
  5. (intransitive) To make a preemptive bid at bridge.

Noun

preempt (plural preempts)

  1. A preemptive bid.
  2. A guaranteed publication deal contingent upon the work being immediately taken off the market and offered to nobody else.
    • Penguin Press editor-in-chief Scott Moyers paid low six figures in a preempt for North American rights to a debut Spanish novel titled The Creator's Map; […]2006, The Publishers Weekly (volume 253, issues 27-34, page 12)

preempt meaning in Tamil, Urdu and Kannada

preempt in Tamil

முன் தடு, முன்னுரிமை

preempt in Urdu

پیش بندی کرنا

preempt in Kannada

ಇತರರಿಗಿಂತ ಮೊದಲೇ ಪಡೆ, ಮೊದಲೇ ಅಧಿಕಾರ ಸ್ಥಾಪಿಸು, ಮೊದಲೇ ಕೊಂಡುಕೊಳ್ಳು, ಮೊದಲೇ ವಶಪಡಿಸಿಕೊಳ್ಳು, ಪೂರ್ವಭಾವಿಯಾಗಿ ಸ್ವಾಧೀನಪಡಿಸಿಕೊ

Examples of preempt in a sentence

  • [...] the losers complaining that their party may see another popular issue preempted by what one of them called "born-again Democratic fiscal conservatives."1980, United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary, Subcommittee on the Constitution, Proposed Constitutional Amendment to Balance the...
  • Leah and Jenny's friendship had happened upon them quickly because of a shared harrowing experience that had preempted the usual years of trust building .2008, Shari Shattuck, Speak of the Devil, Penguin, →ISBN, page 5:
  • A German move from the west had preempted them.2011, David Fraser, And We Shall Shock Them: The British Army in the Second World War, A&C Black, →ISBN:
  • In fact, before Jane said anything at all, Claudia preempted her and began to speak very rapidly.2009, Robb Forman Dew, The Time of Her Life:

Synonyms of preempt

Forms of preempt

Verb
third-person singular presentpreempts
present participlepreempting
past participlepreempted
pastpreempted
alternative formpre-empt
alternative formpreëmpt
alternative form (archaic)præempt
Noun
pluralpreempts

Past tense of preempt: preempted

Origin of preempt

Back-formation from preemption.

Words formed from preempt

Words that rhyme with preempt

Questions about preempt

What does preempt mean?
Preempt means to appropriate first.
What is preempt in Tamil?
Preempt in Tamil is முன் தடு, முன்னுரிமை. See Preempt meaning in Tamil.
How do you use preempt in a sentence?
[...] the losers complaining that their party may see another popular issue preempted by what one of them called "born-again Democratic fiscal conservatives."
What part of speech is preempt?
Preempt can be a verb or a noun.
How do you pronounce preempt?
Preempt is pronounced /ˌpɹiːˈɛmpt/.
What is the past tense of preempt?
The past tense of preempt is preempted.

Words near preempt in the dictionary

  1. preemploy
  2. preemployed
  3. preemploying
  4. preemployment
  5. preemploys
  6. preempt
  7. preemptable
  8. preempted
  9. preemptible
  10. preempting
  11. preemption

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: preempt (page history and authors); preempt (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); preempt (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); preempt (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-preempt.wav.

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