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Glite Dictionary
to hold one's breath

to hold one's breath

10 4.1
To stop breathing for a short time or wait anxiously
  • phrasal verb
translation icon : contener la respiración
  • Jacobson found himself holding his breath, digging his fingers into his desktop.
  • hold his breath underwater
  • held his breath, waiting
  • hold his breath for a minute

Examples

  • Eyes yet on the frail threads, the shimmering manifestation of his prayer, he held his breath, waiting.

    Fiction book (1992)

  • When the roller coaster climbed to its highest point, many riders began to hold their breath in excitement.

  • Try standing on your head and holding your breath.

    Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time (2010)

  • Can you hold your breath underwater?

    Dark Water (2005)

  • I used to hold my breath underwater for long periods at a time.

    The Quiet (2005)

  • I'm teaching Bud how to hold his breath underwater.

    Bio-Dome (1996)

  • The boy stood in the hallway holding his breath, not blinking an eye.

    Fiction book (1998)

  • Jaxom realized that he had been holding his breath and expelled it.

    Fiction book (1991)

  • Then he exhaled as if he'd been holding his breath for a long time.

    Fiction book (1990)

  • Javier sat up, holding his breath as the room spun and then slowly settled down.

    Fiction book (1996)

Synonyms

to suck in one's breath
vsto hold one's breath
2 6.2

To take air into your lungs quickly when you feel surprised, afraid, or before hard work

is the opposite pausing airflow and often waiting anxiously

Antonyms

to exhale
62 2.6

To breathe out air or smoke from your lungs

How Anxious

anxious
201 2.7
suspense
82 3.7
to hold one's breath
10 4.1
to wait
∞ 1.0
patiently
75 1.9

Surface Forms

hold one's breath infinitive
holding one's breath present participle
holds one's breath third person singular
held one's breath past
held one's breath past participle

Morphology

hold + one + breath

The literal sense 'to stop breathing' is directly derivable from 'hold' + 'breath', so the core meaning is transparent to learners who know the words. However, the frequent metaphorical extension ('to wait anxiously' or, in negative imperatives like 'Don't hold your breath!', 'don't expect it') requires pragmatic inference and is not fully predictable from the parts alone, though the mapping is cross-linguistically common. Therefore it is partially but not completely transparent.

Etymology

The idiom hold one's breath comes from the act of holding your breath when you watch or wait for something scary or important. So it came to mean 'to wait anxiously', and in the negative ('don't hold your breath') it means 'do not expect it'.