give the axe

1. 1.

   terminate the employment of; discharge from an office or position

   “The boss fired his secretary today”

   “The company terminated 25% of its workers”

   Synonymsdisplacefiregive noticecandismisssend awaysackforce outgive the sackterminate

   Broaderremove

   Narrowerretirepension offclean outfurloughsqueeze outdismiss
2. 2.

   terminate a relationship abruptly

   “Mary gave John the axe after she saw him with another woman”

   Synonymsgive the bouncegive the gate

   Broaderseparate

Questions about give the axe

What does give the axe mean?

give the axe means "terminate the employment of; discharge from an office or position". That is the primary sense; the word has 2 in total, listed in full on this page.

What is another word for give the axe?

Close synonyms include displace, fire, give notice, can, dismiss. 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 give the axe a common word?

give the axe is banded "Uncommon" — turns up in careful writing rather than conversation. The band comes from how often the word appears in a large corpus of everyday English, not from an editor's impression.