take five

phrase

variants or take ten

US, informal

: to take a brief break (as from work)

They're locked in a fierce debate over the last scene of their film … when camp director and Hollywood veteran Sam Dalton finally orders them to take five.

—Megan Myers

Parry Aftab, the executive director of WiredSafety.org, offers these tips for dealing with troubling messages. … Take five. Instead of replying to a message that upsets you, step away and do something you enjoy for five minutes.

—Nicole Iorio

I could see his anger had nearly boiled over. … Coach Colby, who ran the defense, was the brave soul who stepped in. "Take ten," he said, placing a hand on Orlando's chest. "Cool off. Then suit up and meet at the fifty-yard line. Got it?"

—Brandon Terrell

Examples of take five in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web

Ward imagines a space inside a space, not unlike the custom tents and custom builds popular in luxury weddings right now (one tent took five days to assemble and recreate a Greek Orthodox church, Vogue reported). — Ramishah Maruf, CNN Money, 1 July 2026

Anything required to stay secret for 10 to 15 years may already be at risk if migration takes five. — Maman Ibrahim, Forbes.com, 30 June 2026

In 2024, according to Apple, the world’s iPhone users took five hundred billion selfies. — Cal Revely-Calder, New Yorker, 29 June 2026

In their proof-of-concept work, the researchers used the graphene tattoos to take five kinds of measurements, and compared the data with results from conventional sensors. — IEEE Spectrum, 11 Jan. 2017

Word History

First Known Use

1916, in the meaning defined above

Rhymes for take five

• overdrive
• alive
• archive
• arrive
• beehive
• connive
• contrive
• deprive
• derive
• khedive
• revive
• survive