"fall back" meaning in English

See fall back in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Verb

Forms: falls back [present, singular, third-person], falling back [participle, present], fell back [past], fallen back [participle, past]
Head templates: {{en-verb|fall<,,fell,fallen> back}} fall back (third-person singular simple present falls back, present participle falling back, simple past fell back, past participle fallen back)
  1. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see fall, back. Derived forms: fall-back, fallback Related terms: fall back, fall edge, fall back on, fall back upon, spring forward, fall back
    Sense id: en-fall_back-en-verb-FuqbAxCT
  2. To retreat. Synonyms (retreat): ebb, ebb away, recede, retreat Translations (to retreat): se replier (French), se rabattre (english: sur) (French), recēdō (Latin), retirar (Spanish)
    Sense id: en-fall_back-en-verb-J1w728ft Disambiguation of 'retreat': 0 100 0 0 Disambiguation of 'to retreat': 0 100 0 0
  3. To fail to fulfill a promise or purpose.
    Sense id: en-fall_back-en-verb-yr52PI1M
  4. To turn the clocks back for daylight saving time.
    Sense id: en-fall_back-en-verb-El0hT3jH Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header, English phrasal verbs with particle (back) Disambiguation of English entries with incorrect language header: 8 3 5 84 Disambiguation of English phrasal verbs with particle (back): 14 9 9 68

Inflected forms

Alternative forms

Download JSON data for fall back meaning in English (2.5kB)

{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "falls back",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "falling back",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "fell back",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "fallen back",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "fall<,,fell,fallen> back"
      },
      "expansion": "fall back (third-person singular simple present falls back, present participle falling back, simple past fell back, past participle fallen back)",
      "name": "en-verb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "senses": [
    {
      "derived": [
        {
          "_dis1": "66 0 0 34",
          "word": "fall-back"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "66 0 0 34",
          "word": "fallback"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see fall, back."
      ],
      "id": "en-fall_back-en-verb-FuqbAxCT",
      "links": [
        [
          "fall",
          "fall#English"
        ],
        [
          "back",
          "back#English"
        ]
      ],
      "related": [
        {
          "_dis1": "66 0 0 34",
          "word": "fall back, fall edge"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "66 0 0 34",
          "word": "fall back on"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "66 0 0 34",
          "word": "fall back upon"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "66 0 0 34",
          "word": "spring forward, fall back"
        }
      ]
    },
    {
      "glosses": [
        "To retreat."
      ],
      "id": "en-fall_back-en-verb-J1w728ft",
      "links": [
        [
          "retreat",
          "retreat"
        ]
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "_dis1": "0 100 0 0",
          "sense": "retreat",
          "word": "ebb"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "0 100 0 0",
          "sense": "retreat",
          "word": "ebb away"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "0 100 0 0",
          "sense": "retreat",
          "word": "recede"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "0 100 0 0",
          "sense": "retreat",
          "word": "retreat"
        }
      ],
      "translations": [
        {
          "_dis1": "0 100 0 0",
          "code": "fr",
          "lang": "French",
          "sense": "to retreat",
          "word": "se replier"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "0 100 0 0",
          "code": "fr",
          "english": "sur",
          "lang": "French",
          "sense": "to retreat",
          "word": "se rabattre"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "0 100 0 0",
          "code": "la",
          "lang": "Latin",
          "sense": "to retreat",
          "word": "recēdō"
        },
        {
          "_dis1": "0 100 0 0",
          "code": "es",
          "lang": "Spanish",
          "sense": "to retreat",
          "word": "retirar"
        }
      ]
    },
    {
      "glosses": [
        "To fail to fulfill a promise or purpose."
      ],
      "id": "en-fall_back-en-verb-yr52PI1M",
      "links": [
        [
          "promise",
          "promise"
        ],
        [
          "purpose",
          "purpose"
        ]
      ]
    },
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "_dis": "8 3 5 84",
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
            "Entries with incorrect language header",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w+disamb"
        },
        {
          "_dis": "14 9 9 68",
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English phrasal verbs with particle (back)",
          "parents": [],
          "source": "w+disamb"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To turn the clocks back for daylight saving time."
      ],
      "id": "en-fall_back-en-verb-El0hT3jH",
      "links": [
        [
          "daylight saving time",
          "daylight saving time"
        ]
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "fall back"
}
{
  "categories": [
    "English entries with incorrect language header",
    "English lemmas",
    "English multiword terms",
    "English phrasal verbs",
    "English phrasal verbs with particle (back)",
    "English verbs"
  ],
  "derived": [
    {
      "word": "fall-back"
    },
    {
      "word": "fallback"
    }
  ],
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "falls back",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "falling back",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "fell back",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "fallen back",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "fall<,,fell,fallen> back"
      },
      "expansion": "fall back (third-person singular simple present falls back, present participle falling back, simple past fell back, past participle fallen back)",
      "name": "en-verb"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "related": [
    {
      "word": "fall back, fall edge"
    },
    {
      "word": "fall back on"
    },
    {
      "word": "fall back upon"
    },
    {
      "word": "spring forward, fall back"
    }
  ],
  "senses": [
    {
      "glosses": [
        "Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see fall, back."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "fall",
          "fall#English"
        ],
        [
          "back",
          "back#English"
        ]
      ]
    },
    {
      "glosses": [
        "To retreat."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "retreat",
          "retreat"
        ]
      ]
    },
    {
      "glosses": [
        "To fail to fulfill a promise or purpose."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "promise",
          "promise"
        ],
        [
          "purpose",
          "purpose"
        ]
      ]
    },
    {
      "glosses": [
        "To turn the clocks back for daylight saving time."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "daylight saving time",
          "daylight saving time"
        ]
      ]
    }
  ],
  "synonyms": [
    {
      "sense": "retreat",
      "word": "ebb"
    },
    {
      "sense": "retreat",
      "word": "ebb away"
    },
    {
      "sense": "retreat",
      "word": "recede"
    },
    {
      "sense": "retreat",
      "word": "retreat"
    }
  ],
  "translations": [
    {
      "code": "fr",
      "lang": "French",
      "sense": "to retreat",
      "word": "se replier"
    },
    {
      "code": "fr",
      "english": "sur",
      "lang": "French",
      "sense": "to retreat",
      "word": "se rabattre"
    },
    {
      "code": "la",
      "lang": "Latin",
      "sense": "to retreat",
      "word": "recēdō"
    },
    {
      "code": "es",
      "lang": "Spanish",
      "sense": "to retreat",
      "word": "retirar"
    }
  ],
  "word": "fall back"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-03 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-05-02 using wiktextract (f4fd8c9 and c9440ce). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.