scale back
scale back verb: to make a reduction in the amount, extent, etc. of something.
Verb
scale back (third-person singular simple present scales back, present participle scaling back, simple past and past participle scaled back)
- To make a reduction in the amount, extent, etc. of something.
- I scaled back my hours to be with the kids more.
- The TSSA said that access to the furlough scheme should be reinstated for the cross-Channel operator to protect jobs, while the RMT said a financial 'safety net' was needed to prevent Eurostar "tipping over". It follows similar but unheeded calls made at the very start of the pandemic, when...2022 January 12, “Network News: Unions urge government to provide financial support for Eurostar”, in RAIL, number 948, page 6
- Synonyms:
- scale down
Synonyms of scale back
Antonyms
Forms of scale back
| third-person singular present | scales back |
|---|---|
| present participle | scaling back |
| past participle | scaled back |
| past | scaled back |
Words formed from scale back
Questions about scale back
- What does scale back mean?
- Scale back means to make a reduction in the amount, extent, etc. of something.
- What part of speech is scale back?
- Scale back is a verb.
- What is the past tense of scale back?
- The past tense of scale back is scaled back.
Words near scale back in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: scale back (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:
Cite this entry: “scale back.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/scale_back. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.