Definition of "kill"

kill¹

/kɪl/

verb
third-person singular simple present kills, present participle killing, simple past and past participle killed
1. (transitive) To put to death; to extinguish the life of.
  Quotations
  A Troope of Horſe with Felt: Ile put't in proofe, / And when I haue ſtolne vpon theſe Son in Lawes, / Then kill, kill, kill, kill, kill, kill.
  c. 1603–1606, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of King Lear”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act IV, scene vi], page 304
  Stephano: Monſter, I will kill this man : his daughter and I will be King and Queene, ſave our Graces : and Trinculo and thy ſelfe ſhall be Vice-royes : […]
  1610–1611 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Tempest”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, [Act III, scene ii], page 12
2. (transitive) To render inoperative.
  Quotations
  He killed the motor.
  1965 February, Worlds of If, page 33, column 1
  Peter: Ask Childers if it was worth his arm.Policeman: What did you do to his arm, Peter?Peter: I killed it, with a machine gun.
  1978, John Farris, The Fury
3. (transitive, figuratively) To stop, cease, or render void; to terminate.
  Quotations
  He closed the boot, walked round to the kerbside and bent to peer into the car's interior, his face pressed to the passenger window, his hands shading his eyes to kill the reflection.
  2022, Liam McIlvanney, The Heretic, page 244
4. (transitive, figuratively, hyperbolic) To amaze, exceed, stun, or otherwise incapacitate.
  Quotations
  He told us we ought to think of Jesus as our buddy and all. He said he talked to Jesus all the time. Even when he was driving his car. That killed me.
  1951, J. D. Salinger, The Catcher in the Rye, Little, Brown and Company, page 23
5. (transitive, figuratively, hyperbolic) To cause great pain, discomfort, or distress to; to hurt.
  Quotations
  two laps into our first walk, my dad needed to sit down. His back and legs were killing him. "You'll be okay," I assured him. "You just need to shake off the rust."I gave him a couple of Advil and, after a few minutes, urged him back onto the track.
  2008 October, Davy Rothbart, “How I caught up with dad”, in Men's Health, volume 23, number 8, page 110
6. (transitive, figuratively) To produce feelings of dissatisfaction or revulsion in.
7. (transitive) To use up or to waste.
  Quotations
  Except for the shirt, which he’d worn, and the check, which he’d cashed, and the bottle of port, which he’d killed in bed on Christmas night, the gifts from his family were still on the floor of his bedroom.
  2001, Jonathan Franzen, The Corrections
8. (transitive, figuratively, informal) To exert an overwhelming effect on.
9. (transitive, figuratively, hyperbolic) To overpower, overwhelm, or defeat.
10. (transitive) To force a company out of business.
11. (intransitive, informal, hyperbolic) To produce intense pain.
12. (figuratively, informal, hyperbolic, transitive) To punish severely.
  Quotations
  "Father will kill us for this."
  1925 July – 1926 May, A[rthur] Conan Doyle, “(please specify the chapter number)”, in The Land of Mist (eBook no. 0601351h.html), Australia: Project Gutenberg Australia, published April 2019
13. (transitive, sports) To strike (a ball, etc.) with such force and placement as to make a shot that is impossible to defend against, usually winning a point.
  Quotations
  That close call encouraged Wales to launch another series of attacks that ended when lock Louis Deacon killed the ball illegally in the shadow of England's posts.
  2011 February 4, Gareth Roberts, “Wales 19-26 England”, in BBC‎
14. (transitive, sports) To cause (a ball, etc.) to be out of play, resulting in a stoppage of gameplay.
  Quotations
  As the ball was delivered deep into St Kilda's forward line by Billings, Bontempelli had position on the goal line, with a pack forming in front of him. He decided to fly but didn't kill the ball, leaving it to spill where he had been positioned moments earlier. Jack Sinclair gratefully swooped and kicked a goal that cut the margin to five points.
  2015 May 10, Nathan Schmook, “Billings vs Bont”, in St Kilda Football Club‎
15. To succeed with an audience, especially in comedy.
  Quotations
  When comics fail, they "die"; when they succeed, they "kill."
  2012, Yael Kohen, We Killed: The Rise of Women in American Comedy‎
  You really killed it at the Comedy Store last night.
  2016 February 23, Tim Gray, “Chris Rock Tests Jokes at Comedy Clubs Ahead of Oscars”, in Variety‎
16. (mathematics, transitive, informal) To cause to assume the value zero.
17. (computing, Internet, IRC, transitive) To disconnect (a user) involuntarily from the network.
18. (metallurgy) To deadmelt.
19. (slang) To sexually penetrate in a skillful way.
  Quotations
  I felt on her big fat fanny/Pulled out the jammy and killed the punanni
  1992, Ice Cube (lyrics and music), “It Was A Good Day”, in The Predator
20. (reflexive, informal) To exert oneself to an excessive degree.
noun
plural kills
1. The act of killing.
2. Specifically, the death blow.
3. The result of killing; that which has been killed.
  Quotations
  If ye plunder his kill from a weaker, devour not all in thy pride.
  1895 November, Rudyard Kipling, The Second Jungle Book, London, New York, N.Y.: Macmillan and Co.
4. (volleyball) The grounding of the ball on the opponent's court, winning the rally.
  Quotations
  As a senior in 1993, Turner had a kill percentage of 40.8, which was a school record at the time and the best in the SAC. Turner concluded her volleyball career with 1,349 kills, ranking fifth all-time at Catawba.
  2011, the 34th Catawba College Sports Hall of Fame, in Catawba College's Campus Magazine, Spring/Summer 2011, page 21

kill²

/kɪl/

noun
plural kills
1. (north-east US) A creek; a body of water; a channel or arm of the sea.

kill³

/kɪl/

noun
plural kills
1. (rare) Alternative form of kiln
  Quotations
  This very curious and valuable record is as follows, in the handwriting of Conyers and the accompanying engraving is carefully reduced (see Fig. 138 ) from Conyers' own drawing:—“This kill was full of the coarser sorts of potts or cullings, so that few were saved whole, viz., lamps, bottles, urnes, dishes.
  1878, Llewellynn Frederick William Jewitt, The Ceramic Art of Great Britain from Pre-historic Times Down to the Present Day, page 39
  The stack of one of the pottery kills is still a visible land mark of this once thriving industry.
  1945, Arthur Edwin James, The Potters and Potteries of Chester County, Pennsylvania, page 34
  A funerary ceremony comparable to that reported from Kolomoki site is indicated, though no "pottery kill” was located.
  1951, Bulletin - Eastern States Archeological Federation, page 11
  We may indeed assume that cracked and broken ware was discarded in the immediate vicinity of the pottery kills, that is, if it was not thrown in to the Krka.
  2000, Argo - Volume 43, Issue 1, page 59
  Admonished that she should “keep the woman's virtue and be more silent,” she countered “that she was 'born in a mill, begot in a kill, she must have her will,' she could speak no softlier.”
  2015, Kirilka Stavreva, Words Like Daggers, page 77

Definition of "kill"

kill1

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kill2

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kill3

noun

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kill¹

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kill³