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Glite Dictionary
to sweat off

to sweat off

1 4.8
To lose weight by sweating, often during hard exercise or heat
  • phrasal verb
  • Informal
translation icon : perder peso sudando
  • After my workout, I felt great knowing I had managed to sweat off several pounds.
  • sweat off pounds

Examples

  • Maybe we sweated off a few pounds as well.

    Blog text (3)

  • Sure, you've heard that men love women with curves, but how about those extra pounds you've been trying to sweat off at the gym?

    Blog text (20)

  • Get in the hot box and sweat off that steak and chocolate cake.

    The Story of Seabiscuit (1949)

  • All right, let's eat and shower this Pilates sweat off my face and body.

  • After spending the night sleeping in garbage bags to help him "sweat off" any excess weight.

    Academic text (2004)

  • "It's the first time in my life I can eat anything I want, because I probably sweat off five pounds a night out there," she said, wondering if she should take him upstairs to the suite and order some champagne.

    Fiction book (1991)

  • Running in the heat always helps me sweat off extra water weight quickly.

  • If you hit the gym regularly, you can sweat off those holiday pounds in no time.

Synonyms

to burn off
vsto sweat off
8 3.4

Use up energy by physical activity

focuses on fluid loss from heat or exercise rather than using body energy
to melt off
vsto sweat off
  • Informal
1 4.1

To lose extra body weight slowly until it goes away

loses weight or body fluid quickly from heat or exercise causing perspiration

Antonyms

weight gaining
12 4.4

A period of eating and training to add body weight, often muscle

retention
  • Specialized
9 4.8

Ability of a material like cloth or soil to hold liquid

Surface Forms

sweat off infinitive
sweat off past
sweat off past participle
sweating off present participle
sweats off third person singular

Morphology

sweat + off

The meaning 'to lose weight or bodily fluid through sweating' is directly derivable from combining 'sweat' (emit perspiration) with 'off' (indicating removal), so a learner who knows both words can infer that something is being removed by sweating. The particle 'off' commonly marks removal in English and similar compositional patterns exist cross-linguistically, making this expression transparent to B1 learners.

Etymology

The phrasal verb sweat off comes from a simple image: sweat running off a person's body after hard exercise or in a hot room. People try to sweat off extra pounds or water by training or using heat, so the phrase means 'to lose weight or body fluid by sweating'.