Definition of queue
1 : a braid of hair usually worn hanging at the back of the head
2 : a waiting line especially of persons or vehicles
3a : a sequence of messages or jobs held in temporary storage awaiting transmission or processingb : a data structure that consists of a list of records such that records are added at one end and removed from the other
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Examples of queue in a Sentence
The Tiong Bahru hawker center in Singapore might well be my favorite place in the world to start the day. I remember vividly my first visit: I arrived jetlagged and hungry at seven in the morning to find vendors stir-frying greens in gigantic woks, sending up whooshes of smoke fragrant with garlic. Long queues of businessmen and construction workers and families who likely lived in the nearby housing projects snaked from the cash register of each stall. —James Oseland, Saveur, October 2008
Around the time the Soviet Union ceased to exist, I was waiting in the entry queue at Fiumicino Airport in Rome when I noticed a party of several dozen young Russian girls being fast-tracked past a freshly opened control window. —Peter Robb, New York Times Book Review, 25 May 2008
But many more people deserve the Nobel than get it. Krauss should've gotten it years ago. Though by now so many other discoveries have been made that he's farther down in an ever increasing queue. —Carl Djerassi Cantor's Dilemma, 1989
We were forced to stand in a queue.
Three jobs remain in the printer queue.
Recent Examples of queue from the Web
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And definitely don’t waste more explaining to guests the concept of adding tracks to the queue rather than abruptly changing the song (resulting in vibe suicide).
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One of those lines ran around the north side of the building and connected with another queue that was strung out past the Texas A&M law school and the Fort Worth Convention Center garage.
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Some 51 enterprises have gotten the green light to grow pot, and 815 applicants are in the queue.
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The grumbling of thousands of uprooted officials will add to that of bigwigs miffed by Mr Cai’s queue-jumping career.
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Proponents of the plan say that privatizing the nation’s air traffic control system will lead to faster implementation of GPS technology that will result in fewer flight delays and queues on the tarmac.
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Charlotte fans should hopefully expect a shorter queue Sunday.
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The queue moved slowly but the atmosphere was good.
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Three blocks away, people lined up in a long queue snaking out of a large supermarket; the line had reached the sidewalk in front of us.
These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'queue.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Is it que, queue, or q?
One of our persistent—and more puzzling—lookups is for the word que, which is entered in our dictionary (capitalized) as an abbreviation for Quebec. Qué is also a Spanish word that means “what.” That is not, however, the word that many people are looking for when they look up que in our dictionary. Que is homophonous with a number of other words, most of which have wildly different spellings and meanings. One of the words that people are looking for when they look up que is queue, a word that means “line” (as in, “We waited in the ticket queue.”) Sometimes people are looking for the homonym cue, or “a signal to start or do something” (“The lights just went out—that’s my cue to start the movie.”). Very occasionally, people look up que for coup, a word that refers to a violent and sudden overthrow or takeover of a government (“reports on the latest coup attempt”). And if you’re looking for the phonetic spelling of the letter q, try again: that’s cue.
Origin and Etymology of queue
French, literally, tail, from Old French cue, coe, from Latin cauda, coda
Definition of queue
queued
;queuing
orqueueing
transitive verb
: to arrange or form in a queue (see 1queue)
intransitive verb
: to line up or wait in a queue —often used with up
queuer
nounExamples of queue in a Sentence
The World's Food Fair, Boston. October 1896. Admission: 25 cents. Huge crowds throng the Mechanics Hall convention center. Women queue up for free samples from 200 different vendors: cereals, gelatins, extracts, candy, and custards. —Christopher Kimball, Cook's Illustrated, January & February 2008
Nothing hacks off a national lawmaker more than a person who will not wait in line, unless that line is in front of an elevator at the U.S. Capitol, where Senators and Representatives use private elevators, lest they have to queue with their constituents. —Steve Rushin, Time, 10 Sept. 2007
The crowd was queuing at the snack bar.
Recent Examples of queue from the Web
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Marijuana legalization advocate Cher Neufer queued up at a Cincinnati post office in mid-June expecting to mail a t-shirt to a donor.
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As cars queued up in MainStrasse on Saturday, Morie Rose ran out and gave people stuck in traffic smoothies.
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So queue up the spinner porn and place your order before this trend goes out of style in the bedroom.
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Students cramming on the weekend received tins of steaming soup their parents had queued patiently to deliver.
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After more than a decade in development, Cirrus Aircraft has finally begun delivering its new SF50 Vision Jet to the first of more than 600 customers who’ve queued up for it.
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By the time the gates opened at 4 p.m., nearly 500 people were queued up, with Margaret Austin first in line.
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Five years later, Union JACK is still selling a version of this Britain: a weird and wacky island with certain cultural touchstones that everyone, Brexiteers and Remoaners alike, can love and share: tea, queuing, The Great British Bake Off.
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That was apparently good enough for many at the show, who queued up to give it a go.
These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'queue.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.
Origin and Etymology of queue
see 1queue
QUEUE Defined for English Language Learners
queue
playDefinition of queue for English Language Learners
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: a line of people who are waiting for something
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computers : a series of instructions that are stored in a computer so that they can be processed later
QUEUE Defined for Kids
Definition of queue for Students
queued
;queuing
orqueueing
: to form or wait in a line People are queuing for tickets.
Learn More about queue
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See words that rhyme with queue Thesaurus: All synonyms and antonyms for queue Spanish Central: Translation of queue Nglish: Translation of queue for Spanish speakers Britannica English: Translation of queue for Arabic speakers
Seen and Heard
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