bars

1. 1
   noun

   Plural of bar.

   The chocolate came in individual bars wrapped in gold foil.

   Steel bars reinforced the concrete foundation against earthquakes.

   Note

   One plural serves every kind of bar: rods of metal or wood, slabs of soap or chocolate, the stripes of a bar chart, the strokes used as punctuation. In US metal stock, a bar must be at least a quarter inch in its smallest dimension, and anything thinner is sold as strip. The same spelling is also the verb meaning blocks or forbids: "the bars" is a noun, "it bars" a verb.

2. 2
   verb

   Third-person singular simple present indicative of bar.

   The new policy bars visitors from entering after midnight.

   A fallen tree bars the only path through the woods.

   Note

   The present-tense verb always takes an object: something bars a path, or bars a door with a bolt. When it means forbids, it usually pairs the object with "from", as in "bars visitors from entering." Read the sentence for a verb slot to tell it from the plural noun.

3. 3
   nounslangcountableplural

   Skillfully constructed lines in rap, prized for their wordplay, rhythm, and lyrical craft.

   Like a knockout punchline in comedy: the line the audience quotes on the way out.

   Critics praised her verse for packing more bars into thirty seconds than most full albums.

   The crowd went quiet, then erupted when he delivered the kind of bars they had been waiting for.

   Similarlines, rhymes

   Note

   A hip-hop word of praise, almost always the object of "spit": an emcee spits bars, or spits hot bars. It now appears in scholarship too. Shanté Paradigm Smalls glosses it in 2022 as "good rhymes". It is still slang, so outside writing about hip-hop it reads as borrowed street talk. Use it to praise rap specifically, not lyrics in general.

4. 4
   nounpluralabbreviationellipsis

   Ellipsis of parallel bars.

   In the men's final, he scored highest on the bars with a flawless support routine.

   Gripping both even rails, the gymnast lifted into a shoulder stand on the bars.

   Note

   Gymnastics shortens apparatus names once context makes them clear, and this is the men's case: two horizontal rails a small distance apart, used for swings, holds, jumps and dips. The word is plural-only, so a gymnast works on the bars, never on a bar. The women's apparatus is clipped the same way, so a mixed meet needs the full name to tell it from the uneven bars.

5. 5
   nounpluralabbreviationellipsis

   Ellipsis of uneven bars.

   She caught the higher rail after a full release on the bars.

   Her routine on the bars featured several daring release moves between the two levels.

   Note

   Height is what sets the women's apparatus apart. Its two rails sit at different levels, so a routine travels between them through releases, transitions and pirouettes. The shortening is the same one that turns the men's parallel bars into plain "bars", so the full name is the safer choice whenever both apparatus could be meant.

6. 6
   nounplural

   An event in gymnastics contested on the bars apparatus.

   She qualified for the bars and the floor at the regional meet.

   The bars proved decisive, separating the top two competitors by a tenth of a point.

   Note

   Here the word names a competition rather than a piece of equipment. It sits on a results sheet beside floor and the other events, and gymnasts qualify for it, win it or lose ground on it. Like the apparatus it comes from, it is plural-only and takes the definite article: she won the bars, not she won bars.

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