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Glite Dictionary
🏚️ Containing nothing 😶 Lacking feeling 🧹 To remove contents 🥤 Used containers
empty

empty

3 3.2
A used bottle or can that people return for money
  • noun
  • /ˈɛmpti/
translation icon : envase vacío
  • The recycling center accepts all empties that can be returned for reuse.

So I've been saving these empties up for the last five months.

Examples

  • So I've been saving these empties up for the last five months.

    Julia Adams MUA

  • An old, almost empty bottle of eye drops.

  • I thought I'll get us an empty glass each and a jug.

  • You will see the cigarette bottles on the wall and all the empty bottles in the hall.

  • He filled the crate with all the empties collected from the picnic.

  • The store offers a discount if you bring back your empties for recycling.

Idioms

running on empty
  • Informal
3 7.0

Very tired and having no energy or fuel left

glass half-empty
  • Informal
2 6.5

A person who often sees the negative side of things

Compounds

empty promise
10 3.8

A promise someone makes without any plan to keep it

empty suit
  • Offensive
7 8.1

A person in a position of power who has no real skills

empty nester
4 6.6

A parent whose children have grown up and left home

empty words
3 5.1

Talk that has no real meaning and is not useful

empty talk
1 4.3

Words that sound important but have no real meaning or action

empty-bellied
4.1

Feeling hungry and weak

empty quiver
  • Literature
9.9

Having nothing needed to deal with a problem

Empty Quiver approach
  • Jargon
9.9

To use all available resources and keep nothing in reserve

empty tomb
7.7

A monument honoring a person whose body is elsewhere or cannot be found

How Full

bottleful
2.2
empty
3 3.2

Surface Forms

empty singular
empties plural

Etymology

Empty used as a noun for a bottle comes from the adjective empty meaning 'not filled', so people began to call a used bottle an 'empty' because it was 'without' its drink.