Word.ws English Dictionary

run out on

run out on verb: to leave a partner or commitment suddenly and without prior warning.

Verb

run out on (third-person singular simple present runs out on, present participle running out on, simple past ran out on, past participle run out on)

  1. (idiomatic) To leave a partner or commitment suddenly and without prior warning.
    • Vinton's former wife, Mitzi, ran out on him. Naomi had four previous marriages, to Tom, Bill, Leonard and George.2011, Vincent Terrace, Encyclopedia of Television Shows, 1925 Through 2010, 2d Ed., Volume 3, page 648
  2. (idiomatic) To leave a restaurant without paying the bill; to dine and dash.
    • I saw him run out on the check at an Applebee's.

Forms of run out on

third-person singular presentruns out on
present participlerunning out on
pastran out on
past participlerun out on

Questions about run out on

What does run out on mean?
Run out on means to leave a partner or commitment suddenly and without prior warning.
What part of speech is run out on?
Run out on is a verb.
What is the past tense of run out on?
The past tense of run out on is ran out on.

Words near run out on in the dictionary

  1. run out
  2. run out of gas
  3. run out of road
  4. run out of steam
  5. run out of town
  6. run out on
  7. run out the clock
  8. run outs
  9. run over
  10. run past
  11. run point

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: run out on (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: “run out on.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/run_out_on. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.