run out

verb

ran out; run out; running out; runs out

intransitive verb

1

a

: to come to an end : expire

time ran out

b

: to become exhausted or used up

the gasoline ran out

2

: to jut out

transitive verb

1

a

: to finish out (a course, a series, a contest, etc.) : complete

b

of a baseball batter : to run hard to first base after hitting (a batted ball)

ran out the grounder

2

a

: to fill out (a typeset line) with quads, leaders, or ornaments

b

: to set (a line of text, such as the first line of a paragraph) with a hanging indention

3

: to exhaust (oneself) in running

4

: to cause to leave by force or coercion : expel

see also:

run out of run out on

Examples of run out in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Cristobal Olivares | Bloomberg | Getty Images The global oil market is running out of safety nets. — Sam Meredith, CNBC, 15 Sep. 2026

According to these measurements, even the fattest of the birds would run out of fuel—body fat and a bit of muscle—after about twenty-five hundred miles. — Rivka Galchen, New Yorker, 14 Sep. 2026

View gallery - 11 images The humble shipping container is little more than a basic metal box, but designers and architects never seem to run out of ideas for what to do with it. — New Atlas, 14 Sep. 2026

In 2005, a plane flying from Italy to Tunisia ran out of gas due to a faulty fuel gage and crashed into the Mediterranean Sea near Sicily, killing 16 people, investigators said. — Alexandra Skores, CNN Money, 14 Sep. 2026

Word History

First Known Use

14th century, in the meaning defined at intransitive sense 1a

Rhymes for run out

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

Kids Definition

run out

verb

1

: to come to an end : expire

time ran out before we could tie the game

2

: to become exhausted or used up

our supplies were running out