tick over

1. 1.

   run disconnected or idle

   “the engine is idling”

   Synonymsidle

Questions about tick over

What does tick over mean?

tick over means "run disconnected or idle".

What is another word for tick over?

Close synonyms include idle. 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 tick over a common word?

tick over 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.