behave

Other forms of behave

past tense

behaved·

present participle

behaving·

third person

behaves·

Forms marked · are formed by the regular rule rather than recorded in the source data. English keeps a few hundred irregulars and the rest follow the pattern, so the rule is right far more often than not — but it is a rule, and the mark says so.

Questions about behave

What does behave mean?

behave means "behave in a certain manner; show a certain behavior; conduct or comport oneself". That is the primary sense; the word has 3 in total, listed in full on this page.

How many syllables are in behave?

behave has 2 syllables: be-have. The stress falls on "have". In IPA it is /bɪˈheɪv/.

What is another word for behave?

Close synonyms include act, do, acquit, bear, deport. Each sense on this page lists its own synonyms, because a word with several meanings rarely has one substitute that works for all of them.

What is the opposite of behave?

The recorded antonyms are misbehave.

Is behave a common word?

behave is banded "Common" — everyday vocabulary in speech and writing. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.

What rhymes with behave?

1 word rhymes with behave. Rhymes are matched on the phonemes from the last stressed vowel onward, which is the definition a reader has in their head.