cease

1. 1.

   put an end to a state or an activity

   “Quit teasing your little brother”

   Synonymsdiscontinuestopgive upquitlay off

   Narrowerdropleave offsign offretirepull the plugshut offcheesecall it quitsbreak
2. 2.

   have an end, in a temporal, spatial, or quantitative sense; either spatial or metaphorical

   “the bronchioles terminate in a capillary bed”

   “Your rights stop where you infringe upon the rights of other”

   “My property ends by the bushes”

   “The symphony ends in a pianissimo”

   Synonymsendstopfinishterminate

   Narrowerpass awaylapsecut outgo outadjournvanishculminaterun outrun lowconclude

1. 1.

   (`cease' is a noun only in the phrase `without cease') end

   Broaderend

Other forms of cease

plural

ceases·

past tense

ceased·

present participle

ceasing·

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 cease

What does cease mean?

cease means "put an end to a state or an activity". That is the primary sense; the word has 3 in total, listed in full on this page.

How many syllables are in cease?

cease has 1 syllable: cease. In IPA it is /ˈsis/.

What is another word for cease?

Close synonyms include discontinue, stop, give up, quit, lay off. 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.

Is cease a common word?

cease 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 cease?

2 words rhyme with cease. Rhymes are matched on the phonemes from the last stressed vowel onward, which is the definition a reader has in their head.