Word.ws English Dictionary

shake out

shake out verb: to agitate a piece of cloth or other flexible material in order to remove dust, or to try to make it smooth and flat.

Verb

shake out (third-person singular simple present shakes out, present participle shaking out, simple past shook out, past participle shaken out)

  1. (also, figuratively, transitive) To agitate a piece of cloth or other flexible material in order to remove dust, or to try to make it smooth and flat.
    • Tasks needed to complete Crossrail: [...] Trial run the Class 345s over many thousands of miles on the completed railway to shake out any problems and ensure the highest levels of safety and reliability when passenger service begins.2019 November 20, “Further testing requirements delay Crossrail to 2021”, in Rail, page 13
  2. (transitive) To unfurl a reef from a sail
    • "Thunder!" he cried. "A week! I can't do that; they'd have the black spot on me by then. The lubbers is going about to get the wind of me this blessed moment; lubbers as couldn't keep what they got, and want to nail what is another's. Is that seamanly behavior, now, I want to know? But I'm a saving...1881–1882, Robert Louis Stevenson, Treasure Island, London; Paris: Cassell & Company, published 14 November 1883, →OCLC
  3. (idiomatic) To result or transpire.
    • We are curious to see how this all shakes out.
  4. To shake one's arms or legs, in order to resist muscle fatigue.

shake out meaning in Marathi and Malayalam

shake out in Marathi

to shake out, brush off
झटकणे j̈haṭakṇe

shake out in Malayalam

to shake out, to shake
കുടയുക kuṭayuka

Forms of shake out

third-person singular presentshakes out
present participleshaking out
pastshook out
past participleshaken out

Questions about shake out

What does shake out mean?
Shake out means to agitate a piece of cloth or other flexible material in order to remove dust, or to try to make it smooth and flat.
What is shake out in Marathi?
Shake out in Marathi is झटकणे (j̈haṭakṇe). See Shake out meaning in Marathi.
What part of speech is shake out?
Shake out is a verb.
What is the past tense of shake out?
The past tense of shake out is shook out.

Words near shake out in the dictionary

  1. shake on it
  2. shake one's ass
  3. shake one's elbow
  4. shake one's head
  5. shake one's hocks
  6. shake out
  7. shake over
  8. shake table
  9. shake tables
  10. shake the dust from one's feet
  11. shake the dust from one's sandals

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: shake out (page history and authors); झटकणे (Marathi) (page history and authors); കുടയുക (Malayalam) (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: “shake out.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/shake_out. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.