Word.ws English Dictionary

sweep

UK/swiːp//swip/

sweep verb: to clean (a surface) by means of a stroking motion of a broom or brush. Also the singular of sweeps.

sweep: to clean (a surface) by means of a stroking motion of a broom or brush
Image: Mawakhiwe, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Verb

sweep (third-person singular simple present sweeps, present participle sweeping, simple past and past participle swept)

  1. (transitive) To clean (a surface) by means of a stroking motion of a broom or brush.
    • to sweep a floor, the street, or a chimney
    • I will sweep it with the besom of destruction.1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Isaiah 14:23
  2. (intransitive) To move through a (horizontal) arc or similar long stroke.
    • The wind sweeps across the plain.
    • The offended countess swept out of the ballroom.
    Synonyms:
    swing
  3. (transitive) To search (a place) methodically.
  4. (figuratively, intransitive) To travel quickly.
    • Drifting thus, we made fast time down the bank through Cove Bay, and at 72 m.p.h. came sweeping round the curve past Girdleness light house, and so to the first sight of Aberdeen itself.1947 January and February, O. S. Nock, “"The Aberdonian" in Wartime”, in Railway Magazine, page 9
    • Everton took that disputed lead in a moment that caused anger to sweep around the Emirates.2011 February 1, Phil McNulty, “Arsenal 2-1 Everton”, in BBC
    Synonyms:
    They've swept to power with an overwhelming majority.
  5. To play a sweep shot.
  6. To brush the ice in front of a moving stone, causing it to travel farther and to curl less.
  7. (ergative, transitive) To move something in a long sweeping motion, as a broom.
  8. (transitive) To win (a series) without drawing or losing any of the games in that series.
  9. (transitive) To defeat (a team) in a series without drawing or losing any of the games in that series.
  10. To clear (a body of water or part thereof) of mines.
    • The channel was swept twice before the battlefleet proceeded through it.
  11. (transitive) To remove something abruptly and thoroughly.
    • She swept the peelings off the table onto the floor.
    • The wind sweeps the snow from the hills.
  12. To brush against or over; to rub lightly along.
    • Their long descending train, / With rubies edg'd and sapphires, swept the plain.1700, [John] Dryden, “The Flower and the Leaf: Or, The Lady in the Arbour. A Vision.”, in Fables Ancient and Modern; […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC
    • Mind you, clothes were clothes in those days. […] Frills, ruffles, flounces, lace, complicated seams and gores: not only did they sweep the ground and have to be held up in one hand elegantly as you walked along, but they had little capes or coats or feather boas.1977, Agatha Christie, chapter 4, in An Autobiography, part II, London: Collins, →ISBN
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  1. To carry with a long, swinging, or dragging motion; hence, to carry in a stately or proud fashion.
    • And like a peacock sweep along his tail.1591 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Sixt”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward]...
  2. To strike with a long stroke.
    • Deſcend ye nine! deſcend and ſing; / The breathing inſtruments inſpire, / VVake into voice each ſilent ſtring, / And ſvveep the ſounding lyre!1687 (date written), Alexander Pope, “Ode for Musick on St. Cecilia’s Day”, in The Works of Mr. Alexander Pope, volume I, London: […] W[illiam] Bowyer, for Bernard Lintot, […], →OCLC, canto I, page...
  3. To row with one oar to either the port or starboard side.
  4. To draw or drag something over.
    • to sweep the bottom of a river with a net
  5. To pass over, or traverse, with the eye or with an instrument of observation.
    • to sweep the heavens with a telescope
    • O5-8 does an impressive job of controlling himself, keeping his attention focused on Marion. Clay doesn't fare so well, and quickly sweeps the whole room, even checking behind his back. Making an ass of himself, essentially. He finds nothing. He looks baffled.2008–2021, qntm, “We Need To Talk About Fifty-Five”, in There Is No Antimemetics Division, →ISBN, page 13
  6. (Pennsylvania, Western, Ohio, Indiana) To vacuum a carpet or rug.

Noun

sweep (plural sweeps)

  1. A single action of sweeping.
    • Give the front steps a quick sweep to get rid of those fallen leaves.
  2. The person who steers a dragon boat.
  3. A person who stands at the stern of a surf boat, steering with a steering oar and commanding the crew.
  4. A chimney sweep.
    • He was, perhaps, the English railwayman's conception of the French mécanicien - short and broad, black as a sweep even before we left Calais (but no blacker than I was on arrival at Paris) and wearing goggles and his uniform cap back to front.1961 February, Balmore [pseudonym], “Driving and firing modern French steam locomotives - Part One”, in Trains Illustrated, page 112
  5. A methodical search, typically for bugs (electronic listening devices).
  6. A batsman's shot, played from a kneeling position with a swinging horizontal bat.
    • Bradman attempted a sweep, but in fact top edged the ball to the wicket keeper
  7. A lottery, usually on the results of a sporting event, where players win if their randomly chosen team wins.
    • Jim will win fifty dollars in the office sweep if Japan wins the World Cup.
  8. A flow of water parallel to shore caused by wave action at an ocean beach or at a point or headland.
  9. The degree to which an aircraft's wings are angled backwards (or, occasionally, forwards) from their attachments to the fuselage.
    • The MiG-17's inner wing has 45 degrees of sweep.
  10. A throw or takedown that primarily uses the legs to attack an opponent's legs.
  11. Violent and general destruction.
    • the sweep of an epidemic disease
  12. A movable template for making moulds, in loam moulding.
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  1. In the game casino, the act of capturing all face-up cards from the table.
  2. The compass of any turning body or of any motion.
    • the sweep of a door; the sweep of the eye
  3. Direction or departure of a curve, a road, an arch, etc. away from a rectilinear line.
    • the road which makes a small sweep1815 February 24, [Walter Scott], Guy Mannering; or, The Astrologer. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), Edinburgh: […] James Ballantyne and Co. for Longman, Hurst, Rees, Orme, and Brown...
  4. A large oar used in small vessels, partly to propel them and partly to steer them.
    • I intend to muffle the sweeps and row the schooner up to the head of the creek there, from which point we can command the pile of sandal-wood with our gun.1857 December, R[obert]. M[ichael]. Ballantyne, The Coral Island, page 258
  5. (attributive) A rowing style in which each rower rows with oar on either the port or starboard side.
    • I am primarily a sweep rower.
  6. (obsolete, refining) The almond furnace.
  7. A long pole, or piece of timber, moved on a horizontal fulcrum fixed to a tall post and used to raise and lower a bucket in a well for drawing water.
  8. Any of the blades of a windmill.
  9. (in plural) The sweepings of workshops where precious metals are worked, containing filings, etc.
  10. Any of several sea chubs in the family Kyphosidae (subfamily Scorpidinae).
    • Octopus clambered about from hole to hole and startled sweep blurred away as we passed.1993, Tim Winton, Land's Edge, Picador, published 2014, page 28
  11. An expanse or a swath, a strip of land.
    • The Himalaya guards the southern rim of the plateau in one continuous sweep of 2250 km, each end marked by a massive mountain, Nanga Parbat on the Indus in the west and Namjagbarwa at the great bend of the Yarlung Tsangpo in the east.1998, George B. Schaller, Wildlife of the Tibetan Steppe, University of Chicago Press, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 21
  12. (US, possibly, regional) The act of police removing a homeless encampment from a public space.
    • “There’s no new version of sweeps or a better version of sweeps,” said Marcus Moore, who was street homeless prior to the pandemic and is now an organizer with Safety Net Activists.

Also used as

sweep is also the singular of sweeps.

sweep meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Urdu and Bengali

sweep in Hindi

to clean using a broom or brush
सफ़ाई करना safāī karnā

sweep in Tamil

to clean using a broom or brush
பெருக்கு perukku

sweep in Urdu

جھاڑنا, جھاڑو لگانا

sweep in Bengali

ঝাড়ু দেওয়া, ঝাড়ু দেওয়ার জন্য
More languagesFewer languages
sweep in Telugu
ఊడ్చు ūḍcu
sweep in Punjabi
ਝਾਡ਼ੂ ਲਗਾਉਣ ਲਈ
sweep in Gujarati
વાળવું vāḷvũ
sweep in Assamese
সৰা xora, জৰা zora
sweep in Nepali
स्वीपिङ गर्ने
sweep in Arabic
مَسَحَ masaḥa
sweep in Malay
menyapu
sweep in Indonesian
menyapu
sweep in Persian
رُفتن roftan, روبیدن rubidan, جارو کردن jâru kardan
sweep in Thai
กวาด gwàat, ปัดถู bpàt-tǔu
sweep in Vietnamese
quét dọn, quét
sweep in Myanmar
လှည်း hlany:

Examples of sweep in a sentence

  • Some sort of mental and social pathology seemed to sweep over the discourse later that autumn.
  • The sweep of the rocky Southern California coastline off Point Fermin.
  • I used a whisk to sweep the counter, then a push-broom for the floor.

All 40 example sentences with sweep

Synonyms of sweep

  • swing
  • They've swept to power with an overwhelming majority.

Forms of sweep

Verb
third-person singular presentsweeps
present participlesweeping
past participleswept
pastswept
Noun
pluralsweeps

Past tense of sweep: swept

Plural of sweep: sweeps

Origin of sweep

From Middle English swepen, from Proto-West Germanic *swaipijan (unattested in Old English), from Proto-Germanic *swaipijaną. Cognate with Early Modern West Frisian swiepe (“whip, cleanse, sweep”), from Old Frisian swēpa, suepa (“sweep”). More distantly related to Old Norse sveipa (whence Swedish svepa). See also swoop.

Words formed from sweep

Phrases with sweep

Words that rhyme with sweep

30 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about sweep

What does sweep mean?
Sweep means to clean (a surface) by means of a stroking motion of a broom or brush.
What is sweep in Hindi?
Sweep in Hindi is सफ़ाई करना (safāī karnā). See Sweep meaning in Hindi.
What part of speech is sweep?
Sweep can be a verb or a noun.
How do you pronounce sweep?
Sweep is pronounced /swiːp/ (UK).
What is the past tense of sweep?
The past tense of sweep is swept.

Words near sweep in the dictionary

  1. Sweeney
  2. Sweeneys
  3. Sweens
  4. sweeny
  5. Sweenys
  6. sweep
  7. sweep along
  8. sweep aside
  9. sweep away
  10. sweep in
  11. sweep line

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: sweep (page history and authors); sweep (Urdu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); sweep (Bengali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); sweep (Punjabi, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); sweep (Nepali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). 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-us-sweep.ogg, en-au-sweep.ogg.

Cite this entry: “sweep.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/sweep. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.