Word.ws English Dictionary

tide

UK/taɪd/

More pronunciations (1)Fewer pronunciations

British/tɑjd/

tide noun: the daily fluctuation in the level of the sea caused by the gravitational influence of the moon and the sun.

tide: the daily fluctuation in the level of the sea caused by the gravitational influence of the moon and...
Image: Gzzz, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Noun

tide (plural tides)

  1. The daily fluctuation in the level of the sea caused by the gravitational influence of the moon and the sun.
    • The Bristol Channel has some of the world's largest tides.
  2. The associated flow of water.
    • A lot of driftwood was brought in on the tide.
    • We can cross to the island when the tide is out, but it won't move out until around five o'clock.
  3. Any similar gravitational effect on Earth or other body.
    • As well as sea tides, there are much smaller land tides.
    • By far the largest tides on Europa are those caused by the gravitational attraction of Jupiter.
  4. A high-volume flow, literal or figurative; a current or flood.
    • The sewer burst, and a tide of sewage poured into nearby properties.
    • A tide of people crossed over the border.
  5. (figuratively) The tendency or direction of causes, influences, or events; course; current.
    • The tide of public opinion has turned.
    • There is a tide in the affairs of men, / Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune […]1599 (first performance), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Iulius Cæsar”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward]...
  6. (obsolete, except in liturgy) Time, notably anniversary, period or season linked to an ecclesiastical feast.
    • [...] and rest their weary limbs a tide.1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto II”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, stanza xxix
    • Which, at th'appointed tyde, / Each one did make his Bryde1596, Edmund Spenser, Prothalamion
  7. (archaic, regional) A time.
    • The doctor's no good this tide.
  8. (archaic, in-compounds, regional) A point or period of time identified or described by a qualifier.
    • Eventide, noontide, morrowtide, nighttide, moontide, harvesttide, wintertide, summertide, springtide, autumntide etc.
  9. The period of twelve hours.

Verb (1)

tide (third-person singular simple present tides, present participle tiding, simple past and past participle tided)

  1. (transitive) To cause to float with the tide; to drive or carry with the tide or stream.
    • They are tided down the stream.1623, Owen Feltham, Resolves: Divine, Moral, Political
  2. (broadly) To carry over or through a problem or difficulty.
  3. (intransitive, rare) To pour a tide or flood.
    • The ocean tided most impressively.
  4. (intransitive) To work into or out of a river or harbor by drifting with the tide and anchoring when it becomes adverse.

Verb (2)

tide (third-person singular simple present tides, present participle tiding, simple past and past participle tided)

  1. (intransitive, obsolete) To happen, occur.
    • I wit not what may tide us here1779, David Dalrymple, Annals of Scotland, volume II, page 121
    Synonyms:
    betide, befall

tide meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Urdu and Bengali

tide in Hindi

periodic change of sea level — see also flood tide, ebb tide, high tide, low tide
ज्वारभाँटा jvārbhā̃ṭā

tide in Tamil

ஓதம், நீரேற்றம், கடல் ஏற்றம், கடல் ஓதம், ஏற்றவிறக்கம், ஏற்றவற்றம்

tide in Urdu

بہاؤ, جوار بھاٹا, موسم, رت, تہوار, وقت

tide in Bengali

প্রবাহ, ঋতু, সময়, কাল, যথাকাল, ঘটা
More languagesFewer languages
tide in Malayalam
കാലം, പ്രവാഹം, വേലിയേറ്റവും വേലിയിറക്കവും, സമയം
tide in Kannada
ಅಲೆ ale
tide in Punjabi
ਜਵਾਰ ਭਾਟਾ javār bhāṭā
tide in Sanskrit
वेला vélā
tide in Assamese
জোৱাৰ züar
tide in Arabic
مَدّ وَجَزْر madd wa-jazr
tide in Indonesian
pasang surut
tide in Persian
کشند kešand
tide in Vietnamese
thủy triều
tide in Myanmar
ဒီ di, ဒီရေ dire

Examples of tide in a sentence

  • We've encountered a tide of problems.
  • Go I charge thee, inuite them all, let in the tide / Of Knaues once more: my Cook and Ile provide.c. 1605–1608 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Life of Tymon of Athens”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, &...
  • This is the crap our children are learning / But oh, oh, oh, the tide is turning1987, Roger Waters, “The Tide Is Turning”, in Radio K.A.O.S.:
  • Ahead of a summit on Thursday evening in Brussels, the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, said the tide was turning.2026 June 18, Peter Beaumont, Pjotr Sauer, Jennifer Rankin, “Moscow oil refinery struck in Ukraine’s biggest air raid on city since start...
  • What is singular too, the spademen seem to work lazily; they will not work double-tides, even for offer of more wages, though their tide is but seven hours[.]1837, Thomas Carlyle, The French Revolution: A History […], volume (please specify |volume=I to III), London: Chapman and Hall, →OCLC...

All 40 example sentences with tide

Synonyms of tide

All synonyms of tide

Forms of tide

Noun
pluraltides
Verb
third-person singular presenttides
present participletiding
past participletided
pasttided

Plural of tide: tides

Origin of tide

Inherited from Middle English tyde, from Old English tīd, from Proto-West Germanic *tīdi, from Proto-Germanic *tīdiz, from Proto-Indo-European *déh₂itis, from *deh₂y- + *-tis. Related to time. Cognate with Dutch tijd (“time”), German Zeit (“time”), Danish, Norwegian Bokmål, Norwegian Nynorsk, and Swedish tid (“time”), Faroese and Icelandic tíð (“time”).

From Middle English tiden, tide, from Old English tīdan (“to happen”).

Words formed from tide

Phrases with tide

40 more phrasesFewer phrases

Words that rhyme with tide

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about tide

What does tide mean?
Tide means the daily fluctuation in the level of the sea caused by the gravitational influence of the moon and the sun.
What is tide in Hindi?
Tide in Hindi is ज्वारभाँटा (jvārbhā̃ṭā). See Tide meaning in Hindi.
How do you use tide in a sentence?
We've encountered a tide of problems.
What part of speech is tide?
Tide can be a noun or a verb.
How do you pronounce tide?
Tide is pronounced /taɪd/ (UK).
What is the plural of tide?
The plural of tide is tides.

Words near tide in the dictionary

  1. tiddlywinks
  2. Tidds
  3. tiddy
  4. tiddy oggies
  5. tiddy oggy
  6. tide
  7. tide day
  8. tide days
  9. tide dial
  10. tide dials
  11. tide gate

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: tide (page history and authors); tide (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); tide (Urdu Wiktionary) (page history and authors); tide (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors); tide (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); ಅಲೆ (Kannada) (page history and authors); ਜਵਾਰ ਭਾਟਾ (Punjabi) (page history and authors); वेला (Sanskrit) (page history and authors); জোৱাৰ (Assamese) (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-us-tide.ogg.

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