Word.ws English Dictionary

tire

/ˈtaɪ̯ə(ɹ)/US/ˈtaɪ̯ɚ/

tire verb: to become sleepy or weary. Also the US spelling of tyre.

Verb (1)

tire (third-person singular simple present tires, present participle tiring, simple past and past participle tired)

  1. (intransitive) To become sleepy or weary.
    • As Moldova understandably tired after a night of ball chasing, Everton left-back Baines scored his first international goal as his deflected free-kick totally wrong-footed Namasco.2012 September 7, Phil McNulty, “Moldova 0-5 England”, in BBC Sport
  2. (transitive) To make sleepy or weary.
  3. (intransitive) To become bored or impatient (with).
    • I tire of this book.
  4. (transitive) To bore.

Noun (1)

tire (plural tires)

  1. US and Canada spelling of tyre: The rubber covering on a wheel.
  2. A child's apron covering the upper part of the body, and tied with tape or cord; a pinafore. Also tier.
  3. (obsolete) Accoutrements, accessories.
    • the tire of war1705, John Philips, Blenheim
  4. (obsolete) Dress, clothes, attire.
    • Ne spared they to strip her naked all. / Then when they had despoild her tire and call, / Such as she was, their eyes might her behold.1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto VII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC
    • men like apes follow the fashions in tires, gestures, actions: if the king laugh, all laugh […]., New York Review of Books 2001, p.66
  5. A covering for the head; a headdress.
    • And on her head she wore a tyre of gold,1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto X”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC, page 144

Verb (2)

tire (third-person singular simple present tires, present participle tiring, simple past and past participle tired)

  1. (obsolete, transitive) To dress or adorn.
    • [Jezebel] painted her face, and tired her head.1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, 2 Kings 9:30

Verb (3)

tire (third-person singular simple present tires, present participle tiring, simple past and past participle tired)

  1. (obsolete) To seize, pull, and tear prey, as a hawk does.
    • Even as an empty eagle, sharp by fast, / Tires with her beak on feathers, flesh, and bone.1593, [William Shakespeare], Venus and Adonis, London: […] Richard Field, […], →OCLC
    • I grieve myself / To think, when thou shalt be disedged by her / That now thou tirest on, how thy memory / Will then be pang'd by me.1611 April (first recorded performance), William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Cymbeline”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard...
  2. (obsolete) To seize, rend, or tear something as prey; to be fixed upon, or engaged with, anything.
    • and now doth gaſtly death
      With greedie talients gripe my bleeding hart,
      And like a Harpye tires on my life.c. 1587–1588 (date written), [Christopher Marlowe], Tamburlaine the Great. […] The First Part […], 2nd edition, part 1, London: […] [R. Robinson for] Richard Iones, […], published 1592, →OCLC...
    • Thus made she her remove, / And left wrath tyring on her son.1616, George Chapman, Iliad

Noun (2)

tire (plural tires)

  1. A tier, row, or rank.
    • In posture to displode their second tire / Of thunder.1667, John Milton, “Book VI”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished...

Also used as

tire is also the US spelling of tyre.

tire meaning in Hindi, Tagalog, Arabic and Thai

tire in Hindi

to become sleepy
थकान thakān
to become tired
थकना thaknā
to become bored
ऊबना ūbnā

tire in Tagalog

to become tired
mapagod, pagurin

tire in Arabic

to become sleepy
تَعِبَ taʕiba

tire in Thai

to become sleepy
เหนื่อย nʉ̀ai

Examples of tire in a sentence

  • She used a jack to lift her car and changed the tire.
  • In the wintertime, heavy truck tires dig into the road, forming potholes.
  • Adjust your carry from time to time so that you don’t tire too quickly.

All 40 example sentences with tire

Synonyms of tire

12 more synonymsFewer synonyms

All synonyms of tire

Forms of tire

Verb
third-person singular presenttires
present participletiring
past participletired
pasttired
alternative form (dialectal)tyre
Noun
pluraltires

Past tense of tire: tired

Plural of tire: tires

Origin of tire

From Middle English tiren, tirien, teorien, from Old English tȳrian, tēorian (“to fail, cease, become weary, be tired, exhausted; tire, weary, exhaust”), of uncertain origin. Possibly from Proto-West Germanic *teuʀōn (“to cease”), which is possibly from Proto-Indo-European *dews- (“to fail, be behind, lag”). Compare Ancient Greek δεύομαι (deúomai, “to lack”), Sanskrit दोष (dóṣa, “crime, fault, vice, deficiency”).

Probably from Middle English tir(e) (“equipment, furnshings, ornament”). See the details at tyre.

From Middle English tire, from Old French tirer (“to draw or pull”), akin to English tear (“to rend”).

Words formed from tire

Phrases with tire

2 more phrasesFewer phrases

Words that rhyme with tire

48 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about tire

What does tire mean?
Tire means to become sleepy or weary.
What is tire in Hindi?
Tire in Hindi is थकान (thakān), थकना (thaknā), ऊबना (ūbnā). See Tire meaning in Hindi.
What part of speech is tire?
Tire can be a verb or a noun.
How do you pronounce tire?
Tire is pronounced /ˈtaɪ̯ə(ɹ)/ (UK).
What is the past tense of tire?
The past tense of tire is tired.

Words near tire in the dictionary

  1. tiraz
  2. tirbanibulin
  3. tircha d'tzibura
  4. Tircoed
  5. Tircul
  6. tire
  7. tire barrier
  8. tire barriers
  9. tire bead
  10. tire beads
  11. tire chain

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: tire (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: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-tyre.wav.

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