Word.ws English Dictionary

rivals

rivals is the plural of rival.

rivals is the third-person singular simple present indicative of rival.

Meaning of rival

Noun

rival (plural rivals)

  1. A competitor (person, team, company, etc.) with the same goal as another, or striving to attain the same thing. Defeating a rival may be a primary or necessary goal of a competitor.
    • Chris is my biggest rival in the 400-metre race.
  2. Someone or something with similar claims of quality or distinction as another.
    • As a social historian, he has no rival.
  3. (obsolete) One having a common right or privilege with another; a partner.
    • If you do meet Horatio and Marcellus, / The rivals of my watch, bid them make haste.c. 1599–1602 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Hamlet, Prince of Denmarke”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac...

See all 7 meanings of rival

Phrases with rivals

Questions about rivals

What is rivals the plural of?
Rivals is the plural of rival.

Words near rivals in the dictionary

  1. rivalries
  2. rivalrous
  3. rivalrously
  4. rivalrousness
  5. rivalry
  6. rivals
  7. rivalship
  8. rivalships
  9. rivalsome
  10. Rivard
  11. Rivards

Source and license

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