slump
/slʌmp/
slump verb: to collapse heavily or helplessly.
Verb
slump (third-person singular simple present slumps, present participle slumping, simple past and past participle slumped)
- To collapse heavily or helplessly.
- Exhausted, he slumped down onto the sofa.
- “Heavens!” exclaimed Nina, “the blue-stocking and the fogy!—and yours are pale blue, Eileen!—you’re about as self-conscious as Drina—slumping there with your hair tumbling à la Mérode! Oh, it's very picturesque, of course, but a straight spine and good grooming is better.[…]”1907 August, Robert W[illiam] Chambers, chapter IX, in The Younger Set, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC
- Synonyms:
- plump
- To decline or fall off in activity or performance.
- Real estate prices slumped during the recession.
- The Gunners captain demonstrated his importance to the team by taking his tally to an outstanding 28 goals in 27 Premier League games as Chelsea slumped again after their shock defeat at QPR last week.2011 October 29, Phil McNulty, “Chelsea 3-5 Arsenal”, in BBC Sport
- To slouch or droop.
- “Isaac Sachs’s tragic flaw, ” analyzes Isaac Sachs, slumped in the bay window across from Luisa Rey two hours later, “is this. Too cowardly to be a warrior, but not enough of a coward to lie down and roll over like a good doggy.”2004, David Mitchell, “Half-Lives: The First Luisa Rey Mystery”, in Cloud Atlas, →ISBN, page 131
- To lump; to throw together messily.
- These different groups[…]are exclusively slumped together under that sense.a. 1857, William Hamilton, edited by H[enry] L[ongueville] Mansel and John Veitch, Lectures on Metaphysics and Logic […], volume (please specify |volume=I to IV), Edinburgh; London: William Blackwood...
- To fall or sink suddenly through or in, when walking on a surface, as on thawing snow or ice, a bog, etc.
- The latter walk on a bottomless quag, into which unawares they may slump.a. 1678 (date written), Isaac Barrow, “(please specify the chapter name or sermon number)”, in The Works of Dr. Isaac Barrow. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to VII), London: A[braham] J[ohn]...
- To cause to collapse; to hit hard; to render unconscious; to kill.
Noun
slump (plural slumps)
- A heavy or helpless collapse; a slouching or drooping posture; a period of poor activity or performance, especially an extended period.
- A period of poor performance.
- If she doesn't pull out of her slump, her job may be in jeopardy.
- A measure of the fluidity of freshly mixed concrete, based on how much the concrete formed in a standard slump cone sags when the cone is removed.
- A form of mass wasting in which a coherent mass of loosely consolidated materials or a rock layer moves a short distance down a slope.
- A crater or depression (an area where the ground slumps) which forms as a result of such wasting. (A large crater is colloquially called a megaslump.)
- The biggest slump in the world - a mega-slump - is in the Russian taiga. Known as the Batagaika crater, it is a kilometre-long gash in the ground, about 70 metres deep, and growing[…]2022 September 8, Mark Brownlow, Elizabeth White, Frozen Planet II, Random House, →ISBN
- A boggy place.
- The road was all slumps of holes.1880, William Hugh Patterson, A Glossary of Words in Use in the Counties of Antrim and Down
- It was neither seemly nor befitting that so great an occasion should have its solemnity defaced by leaping-poles or four hands crossed cradlewise to convey the bridal finery over “slump” or “quakkin'-qua[g]”!1911, Samuel Rutherford Crockett, Rose of the Wilderness, page 165
- The noise made by anything falling into a hole, or into a soft, miry place.
- The gross amount; the mass; the lump.
- A cobbler-like dessert cooked on a stove.
- a blackberry slump
slump meaning in Tamil, Urdu, Bengali and Malayalam
slump in Tamil
- இறக்கம், தாழ்த்தம், மந்தம், வீழ்ச்சி, தொய்வு, சரிவு
slump in Urdu
- کساد, اچانک, تیزی سے گرنا
slump in Bengali
- মন্দা, আকস্মিক পতন, অবনতি
slump in Malayalam
- അവപാതം, ഇടിഞ്ഞുവീഴുക, വിലയിടിയുക, ചളിയിൽ വീഴുക, പരാജയപ്പെടുക
More languagesFewer languages
- slump in Kannada
- ಆಸಕ್ತಿ ಕುಗ್ಗುವುದು, ಉತ್ಸಾಹಗಳು ಕುಗ್ಗುವುದು, ಬಿದ್ದು ಹೋಗುವುದು, ಧಾರಣೆ ಕುಸಿಯುವುದು
Examples of slump in a sentence
- His recent slump has put him perilously close to the Mendoza line; he may be headed to AAA soon.
- Massive ramparts of stone are slumping, in places alarmingly, by meters each year.
- Phil was slumped over the edge of the mattress, inverted, watching her dress.
Synonyms of slump
Forms of slump
| Verb | |
|---|---|
| third-person singular present | slumps |
| present participle | slumping |
| past participle | slumped |
| past | slumped |
| Noun | |
| plural | slumps |
Origin of slump
Probably of North Germanic origin: compare Danish slumpe (“to stumble upon by chance”), Norwegian slumpe (“happen by chance”), Norwegian slumpa (“happen by chance”), Swedish slumpa (“randomize; to sell off”), Swedish slump (“chance, randomness, happenstance”). Compare also German schlumpen (“to trail; draggle; be sloppy”), dialectal Dutch slompen (“to walk clumsily”).
Words formed from slump
Words that rhyme with slump
18 more rhymesFewer rhymes
Questions about slump
- What does slump mean?
- Slump means to collapse heavily or helplessly.
- What is slump in Tamil?
- Slump in Tamil is இறக்கம், தாழ்த்தம், மந்தம். See Slump meaning in Tamil.
- What part of speech is slump?
- Slump can be a verb or a noun.
- How do you pronounce slump?
- Slump is pronounced /slʌmp/.
- What is the past tense of slump?
- The past tense of slump is slumped.
Words near slump in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: slump (page history and authors); slump (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); slump (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); slump (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); slump (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); slump (Kannada Wiktionary) (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:
Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-slump.ogg.
Cite this entry: “slump.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/slump. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.