ENGLISH · A WORD WITH POSSIBILITIES

bye.

The position of a person or team in a tournament or competition who draws no opponent in a particular round so advances to the next round unopposed, or is awarded points for a win in a league table; also the phantom opponent of such a person or team.

3 characters1 syllables approx.English language

Meaning & usage

noun/baɪ//bɑːj/South-Asia

The position of a person or team in a tournament or competition who draws no opponent in a particular round so advances to the next round unopposed, or is awarded points for a win in a league table; also the phantom opponent of such a person or team.
Craig's Crew plays the bye next week.
An extra scored when the batsmen take runs after the ball has passed the striker without hitting either the bat or the batsman.
A thing not directly aimed at; a secondary or subsidiary object, course, path, undertaking, issue, etc.
obsolete
An unspecified way or place.
Scotland
A pass.

Where this word comes from

Variant form of by, from Old English bī (“being near”).

adj/baɪ//bɑːj/South-Asia

Out of the way; remote.
Secondary; supplementary.

Where this word comes from

Variant form of by, from Old English bī (“being near”).

intj/baɪ//bɑːj/South-Asia

Goodbye.
colloquial
An exclamation of disbelief or dismissal.
slang

Where this word comes from

Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰew- Proto-Indo-European *-tós Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰutós? Proto-Germanic *gudą Proto-West Germanic *god Old English god Middle English god Middle English God English God Proto-Indo-European *bʰuH- Proto-Indo-European *-yéti Proto-Indo-European *bʰuHyétider.? Proto-Germanic *beuną Proto-West Germanic *beun Old English bēon Middle English been English be Proto-Indo-European *dwóh₁ Proto-Indo-European *dwi- Proto-Indo-European *wí Proto-Indo-European *-teros Proto-Indo-European *wíterosder. Proto-Indo-European *wíterom Proto-Germanic *wiþrą Proto-West Germanic *wiþr Old English wiþerclip. Old English wiþ Middle English wiþ English with Proto-Indo-European *uswé Proto-Indo-European *-(m)is? Proto-Indo-European *uswísder. Proto-Germanic *izwiz Proto-West Germanic *iwwiz Old English ēow Middle English yow English you ▲ English goodinflu. English goodbyeclip. English bye Shortened form of goodbye.

noun/baɪ//bɑːj/South-Asia

A command to exit a session.

Where this word comes from

noun/baɪ//bɑːj/South-Asia

Eye dialect spelling of boy.
alt-of · pronunciation-spelling

prep/baɪ//bɑːj/South-Asia

Obsolete spelling of by.
alt-of · obsolete

Where this word comes from

Alternative forms.

noun/baɪ//bɑːj/South-Asia

Obsolete spelling of bee.
alt-of · obsolete

Where this word comes from

Alternative forms.

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Definitions, grammatical labels, IPA, etymology and examples: Wiktionary contributors, extracted by Kaikki / Wiktextract. Adapted under CC BY-SA 4.0. Selected fields and authored examples are shown; third-party quotations and audio are omitted. See contributor history.

Last enriched 2026-09-10. Definitions are in English. Romanizations are shown when supplied by the source; syllable estimates are omitted for unsupported scripts.