Word.ws English Dictionary

sleep with one eye open

sleep with one eye open verb: to remain vigilant at all times, especially by remaining partially awake or sleeping only lightly so as to avoid being caught off guard.

Verb

sleep with one eye open (third-person singular simple present sleeps with one eye open, present participle sleeping with one eye open, simple past and past participle slept with one eye open)

  1. (figuratively) To remain vigilant at all times, especially by remaining partially awake or sleeping only lightly so as to avoid being caught off guard.
    • Sleep with one eye open
      You have no idea what I'm capable of
      Keep claiming holier than thou
      My knife can stab more holes than you can count
      How dare you sleep where a king once slept
      And dry the tears of where his queen has wept2019, “Brimstone”, in Phil Bozeman (lyrics), The Valley (Deathcore), performed by Whitechapel

sleep with one eye open meaning in Hindi and Persian

sleep with one eye open in Hindi

Translations
एक आँख खोलकर सोना ek ā̃kh kholkar sonā

sleep with one eye open in Persian

Translations
با یک چشم باز خوابیدن bâ yek češm bâz xâbidan

Forms of sleep with one eye open

third-person singular presentsleeps with one eye open
present participlesleeping with one eye open
past participleslept with one eye open
pastslept with one eye open

Origin of sleep with one eye open

Some animals sleep with one eye open, so as to remain alert to threats.

Questions about sleep with one eye open

What does sleep with one eye open mean?
Sleep with one eye open means to remain vigilant at all times, especially by remaining partially awake or sleeping only lightly so as to avoid being caught off guard.
What is sleep with one eye open in Hindi?
Sleep with one eye open in Hindi is एक आँख खोलकर सोना (ek ā̃kh kholkar sonā). See Sleep with one eye open meaning in Hindi.
What part of speech is sleep with one eye open?
Sleep with one eye open is a verb.
What is the past tense of sleep with one eye open?
The past tense of sleep with one eye open is slept with one eye open.

Words near sleep with one eye open in the dictionary

  1. sleep twitch
  2. sleep twitches
  3. sleep under the same bridge
  4. sleep well
  5. sleep with
  6. sleep with one eye open
  7. sleep with one's fathers
  8. sleep with the fishes
  9. sleep-at-noon
  10. sleep-ate
  11. sleep-deprived

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: sleep with one eye open (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: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-sleep with one eye open.wav.

Cite this entry: “sleep with one eye open.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sleep_with_one_eye_open. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.