Word.ws English Dictionary

rub one's hands together

rub one's hands together verb: to anticipate something eagerly.

Verb

rub one's hands together (third-person singular simple present rubs one's hands together, present participle rubbing one's hands together, simple past and past participle rubbed one's hands together)

  1. (colloquial, idiomatic) To anticipate something eagerly.
    • ""It's been over 10 years and it's about time we got a little bit more," Ms Tongue pointed out. "I'm rubbing my hands together, definitely.""2017 Interest rate rise: What you are saying BBC News, 2 November 2017. Accessed 3 August 2018.
    • ""But I thought when those two new teams came in … I was rubbing my hands together thinking 'we are going to get a legitimate competition here, we will play everyone once and head into a finals series, you beauty'."2018 Riley Beveridge, No final decision on 2019 AFLW Fixture Brisbane Lions, 3 August 2018. Accessed 3 August 2018.

Forms of rub one's hands together

third-person singular presentrubs one's hands together
present participlerubbing one's hands together
past participlerubbed one's hands together
pastrubbed one's hands together
alternative formrub one's hands

Questions about rub one's hands together

What does rub one's hands together mean?
Rub one's hands together means to anticipate something eagerly.
What part of speech is rub one's hands together?
Rub one's hands together is a verb.
What is the past tense of rub one's hands together?
The past tense of rub one's hands together is rubbed one's hands together.

Words near rub one's hands together in the dictionary

  1. rub off on
  2. rub one off
  3. rub one out
  4. rub one's face with a brass candlestick
  5. rub one's hands
  6. rub one's hands together
  7. rub oneself off
  8. rub out
  9. rub salt in someone's wounds
  10. rub salt in the wound
  11. rub shoulders

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: rub one's hands together (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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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-rub one's hands together.ogg.

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