wear out

verb

wore out; worn out; wearing out; wears out

transitive verb

1

: tire, exhaust

2

: to make useless especially by long or hard usage

3

: erase, efface

4

: to endure through : outlast

wear out a storm

5

: to consume (time) tediously

wear out idle days

intransitive verb

: to become useless from long or excessive wear or use

Synonyms of wear out

• wear
• kill
• tire
• exhaust
• drain
• burn out

Examples of wear out in a Sentence

keeping up with twin toddlers wears me out

Recent Examples on the Web

The artist’s layered blond hair was worn out while white cat eye sunglasses completed her look. — Jaden Thompson, Footwear News, 24 July 2026

But in the end, this mostly dialogue-less experiment, which leans heavily on its lively soundtrack, leaves us emotionally removed and eventually wears out its welcome. — Randy Myers, Mercury News, 23 July 2026

Praedico lines up years of track data to give operators a single view of what is wearing out. — Dara-Abasi Ita, Forbes.com, 23 July 2026

Several of the houses have a special person on staff just for the barrels, a cooper who manufactures and replaces the slats that have worn out. — Kyle Lucia Wu, Condé Nast Traveler, 19 July 2026

Word History

First Known Use

14th century, in the meaning defined at transitive sense 1

Rhymes for wear out

• about
• bailout
• blackout
• blowout
• breakout
• burnout
• buyout
• checkout
• closeout
• cutout
• devout
• dropout

Kids Definition

wear out

verb

1

: to tire gradually

worn out from exercising

2

: to make or become useless by wear