Word.ws English Dictionary

running hot and cold

running hot and cold is the present participle and gerund of run hot and cold.

Meaning of run hot and cold

Verb

run hot and cold (third-person singular simple present runs hot and cold, present participle running hot and cold, simple past ran hot and cold, past participle run hot and cold)

  1. (idiomatic) To alternate between two opposite extremes, such as enthusiasm and disinterest or success and failure.
    • Henrietta's feelings for Delbert run hot and cold—one minute she's hopelessly in love with him, and the next she can't stand the sight of him.

Questions about running hot and cold

What is running hot and cold the present participle and gerund of?
Running hot and cold is the present participle and gerund of run hot and cold.

Words near running hot and cold in the dictionary

  1. running headline
  2. running headlines
  3. running heads
  4. running high
  5. running hot
  6. running hot and cold
  7. running hyena
  8. running in
  9. running in the family
  10. running in with
  11. running interference

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: running hot and cold (page history and authors); run hot and cold (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: “running hot and cold.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/running_hot_and_cold. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.