head start

noun

1

: an advantage granted or achieved at the beginning of a race, a chase, or a competition

a 10-minute head start

2

: a favorable or promising beginning

took some extra classes to get a head start in college

Examples of head start in a Sentence

They gave me a five-minute head start.

She took some extra classes to get a head start in her career.

His natural athletic talent gave him a head start on his peers.

Recent Examples on the Web

Still, the company faces stiff competition establishing itself as an AI leader after giving domestic smartphone makers a head start on embedding AI into their devices. — Bloomberg, Mercury News, 15 July 2026

Besides that head start over building a whole new concept from scratch, Blue Origin also has a functioning crane at its disposal. — Chris Young july 12, New Atlas, 13 July 2026

Anyone can score discounts from July 18 onward, but Nordstrom card members, including members of any of the three Nordy Club tiers, will get a head start on their shopping. — Alyssa Grabinski, PEOPLE, 13 July 2026

This week's revelations show Meta is aggressively trying to make a splash in AI models and compete against OpenAI, Anthropic and Google, which all have big head starts. — Cj Haddad, CNBC, 10 July 2026

Word History

First Known Use

1859, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Rhymes for head start

• apart
• depart
• flowchart
• forepart
• impart
• pushcart
• rampart
• redstart
• restart
• subpart
• sweetheart
• upstart

Kids Definition

head start

noun

1

: an advantage given to a contestant at the beginning of a race

a five-minute head start

2

: a favorable or promising beginning