to sleep over
- phrasal verb
- /sliːp ˈoʊvər/
- Informal
- Without school the next day, she had a friend sleep over and they made dinner together.
Like I don't wanna sleep over after we've had sex.
- Like I don't wanna sleep over after we've had sex.
- I was kissing this boy my freshman year of college and I slept over at his like dorm.
- I'm not going to have the kids sleep over.
- And, and, you know, incidentally, Lincoln told me about sleeping over at the house with with Locke subsequent to this trip.
- I met him that senior and I started sleeping over every single day in his house like towards the end of senior year.
- And we were sitting at the table and I think like, I like I slept over and we were having, you know, eggs, you know, bacon snotty.
Examples
-
Three nights a week she practiced ballet after school, and on weekends she slept over at friends' houses.
Fiction book (1993) -
The boys are sleeping over.
-
Do you want to sleep over here with me?
-
But it's okay with me if your friends sleep over.
-
I'll be sleeping over tonight.
-
You know there is something going on when a boy sleeps over at a girl's house.
Blog text (5) -
How come you didn't sleep over?
-
He's sleeping over at a friend's house.
-
Jane, Mom, is it okay if Angela sleeps over tonight?
Fiction book (1999) -
Do you want to sleep over at my house this weekend?
Synonyms
To live somewhere for a short time, like a hotel or a friend's house
Sleep at someone else's home for the night
Antonyms
How Temporary
- Informal
- UK
- Informal
Surface Forms
Morphology
The meaning 'to stay overnight at someone else's house' is directly derivable from combining 'sleep' (to rest/sleep) with 'over' (indicating duration/throughout or staying at a place), so a B1 learner who knows both constituents would readily infer an overnight stay. This is a common, literal phrasal-verb pattern in English and has clear parallels in many languages, supporting immediate comprehension.
Etymology
Sleep over comes from the simple picture of sleep + over, where 'over' means staying at someone's house for the night. So it means 'to stay overnight at someone else's place'.