go off
Formsgoes off, going off, went off, gone off
Formsgoes off, going off, went off, gone off
- 1
- 2To start ringing, clanging, or making some other noise, as an alarm or bell does.
A car alarm went off in the parking lot and wailed for twenty minutes.
Phones started going off all over the theater when the emergency alert came through.
Note
Here going off means starting: an alarm, a siren or a phone goes off when it begins to sound. That puts it at odds with switching off, where the power goes off and stops. The thing in question settles it: alarms, bells and sirens go off by sounding, while lights, power and heating go off by falling silent.
- 3
- 4
- 5Of a device or system, to stop running or be switched off.
Every streetlight on the block went off at once, leaving us in the dark.
The air conditioning will go off automatically when the room reaches the set temperature.
Similarstop
- 6To take place or be carried out.
Despite the rain, the parade went off exactly as planned.
Organizers hoped the handover would go off peacefully, and it did.
Note
The event usually comes with a word for how it went: the party went off well, the parade went off as planned, the handover went off without a hitch. Elizabeth Gaskell's Wives and Daughters has a wedding that “went off much as such affairs do.” Without that word, went off is more likely to be heard as exploding or leaving.
- 7To rant or talk at length in a negative way, or to insult or criticize someone.
Ask her about the new parking rules and she'll go off about them all evening.
The coach went off on the referees in the post-game interview.
Similarrant
Note
The topic comes in with about, the target with on: people go off about the rent, or a coach goes off on the referees. Unlike a sudden flare of temper, this is talk, and it can run on for some time. It is slang, at home in conversation rather than in careful writing.
- 8To judge by something, or to draw conclusions from it.
Going off last year's numbers, we should sell out of tickets by Friday.
With no witnesses, the detectives had to go off a single blurry photo.
Note
It is mostly met as going off at the head of a phrase, where it does the work of judging by: going off the interview alone, she seemed perfect. What follows is whatever the judgment rests on, whether a set of figures, a single photo, or simply what someone was able to see.
- 9To leave or go away.
He went off in a hurry, leaving his coffee on the table.
Her husband had gone off with a coworker and never come back.
Note
Followed by with, it often means leaving a partner for someone else. In Nick Hornby's High Fidelity (1995) the narrator becomes convinced his girlfriend will go off with one of the men on her design course, and the next line is simply: “She went off with one of them.” On its own, go off is plainer, a matter of walking away.
- 10To rot or become unfit to eat, or to become unusable in any other way.
Fresh fish will go off within a day or two in this heat.
Check the date on last summer's sunscreen, because it may have gone off.
Similarspoil
Note
In British, Australian and Canadian English this is the everyday way to say food has spoiled: the milk's gone off, fish goes off quickly even in the fridge. Where the phrase is less familiar, spoil or go sour does the job. Anything with a shelf life can go off, and the boast that camel milk “never goes off” is one Nancy Abeiderrahmane calls a myth.
- 11To perform brilliantly or look impressive, often used as an exclamation urging someone on.
Want to wear head-to-toe sequins to brunch? Go off.
The whole cast went off in the finale, and the audience was on its feet before the last note.
Note
It is a cheer in LGBTQ slang, usually in the imperative: Go off, queen! It keeps company with slay, serve and kill it. In fashion writing it can shade into a shrug of permission: if you want to splurge on designer frames, go off. Do not confuse it with ranting, which is anything but praise.
- 12To come to like someone or something less over time.
Voters slowly went off the idea as the costs kept rising.
I don't know why, but I seem to go off every show after the second season.
Note
Word order separates this from spoiling: the milk has gone off means it is sour, while I've gone off milk means you no longer like it. It is often in the perfect, with a noun or an -ing form after it (she's gone off cycling), and an animal that has gone off its feed has stopped eating.
- 13To lose consciousness, fall asleep, or die.
The anesthetist told me to count backward from ten, and I went off before I reached seven.
When I go off, I want a party, not a funeral.
Note
Three ways of leaving the waking world share this slang: fainting, dropping off to sleep, and dying. Only the context shows which is meant, so going off in the dentist's chair is a faint, going off after a bedtime story is sleep, and “one day I'll go off” looks much further ahead.
- 14To fight or launch an attack.
Things went off outside the club, and three people were arrested.
Rival fans were ready to go off the moment the gates opened.
Note
The fighting is often told as an event that erupts, with it or things as the subject: it all went off when rival fans met at the station. People can go off too, ready to fight the moment the gates open. It is slang, and formal reports describe the same thing as a fight or an attack.
- 15To ejaculate or have an orgasm.
He apologized for going off too soon.
They were both close, and she went off first.
Similarejaculate
Note
It is frank sexual slang, used between adults who are comfortable with it; ejaculate is the neutral word. Because go off has so many innocent meanings, a sentence like “he went off too soon” depends entirely on its setting to be heard this way, and outside intimate talk it rarely is.
- 16Of epoxy resin, to cure or set.
Once the resin has gone off, you can sand the joint smooth.
In a cold garage the epoxy can take all night to go off.
Note
In chiefly British use, mixed epoxy resin goes off within a set time, and after that the pieces it holds can no longer be moved, so all the lining up has to be done first. The verb takes no object: the material itself goes off. Unlike milk that has spoiled, resin that goes off is doing exactly what it should.
- 17The start or beginning of something.
Corley at the first go-off was inclined to suspect it was something to do with Stephen being fired out of his digs for bringing in a bloody tart off the street.
1922, James Joyce, “[Episode 1: Telemachus]”Similarstart (entry), outset, beginning
Note
The noun lives mostly in the fixed phrase at the first go-off, meaning right at the start. Melville uses it in Moby-Dick (1851), where damp cowhide boots pinch at the first go-off of a bitter cold morning, and Joyce in Ulysses (1922), where Corley at the first go-off suspects Stephen has been thrown out of his digs. The hyphen marks the noun; the verb is two words.
- 18To be spent, paid out, or used up.
Every penny of the prize money went off within a year.
Their savings will soon go off if the roof needs another repair.
Note
Money and stores went off, in this old slang, as they drained away: all his money goes off as soon as he earns it. The use now sounds old-fashioned, and a modern listener may first think of food that spoils, so spent or used up is safer in current writing.
- 19Of a woman, to get married.
Her aunts whispered that she would never go off if she kept turning down every suitor.
Of the five sisters, the youngest went off first, and the wedding was the talk of the village that spring.
Note
Only a woman went off in this archaic British slang, as when a family hoped a daughter or sister would go off soon. It has long dropped out of use, and today it would sound dismissive as well as puzzling; a modern listener is more likely to hear leaving.
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