zone
Pluralzones
Pluralzones
- 1An area set apart from others by its use, its rules, or a special feature.
Like a square on a game board where special rules apply.
Workers marked off a zone where only trucks can enter.
Phones must stay silent in the quiet zone of the library.
UsageOften after a word that says what it is for: a loading zone, a quiet zone.
- 2
- 3
- 4To split something into areas, or to put something in one of those areas.
The teachers zone the playground so each grade has its own space.
Organizers zoned the fairgrounds into food, rides, and parking areas.
UsageOften zone off a space, or zone it into parts.
- 5In baseball, the space over home plate where a pitch counts as a strike.
Like an invisible window the pitcher tries to throw the ball through.
The pitch missed the zone, so the umpire called a ball.
Keep your throws low in the zone and the batters will hit grounders.
Note
- 6One of five big bands of the earth's surface, sorted by how hot or cold they are.
Like the colored stripes that go around a beach ball.
The hot band around the equator was once called the torrid zone.
Long ago, people split the earth into five zones by heat and cold.
Note
- 7One of the three parts of a hockey rink, marked off by two blue lines.
Like a soccer field cut into three strips by two painted lines.
She skated fast into the other team's zone with the puck.
Players must wait until the puck crosses into the zone before they follow it.
Note
Less common meanings
- 8A time when someone plays or works at their very best with full focus.
Like riding a bike downhill when everything suddenly feels easy.
She was in the zone and made every basket.
Once the music started, the drummer found his zone.
UsageUsually be in the zone or get in the zone.
Similargroove
Note
- 9To stop paying attention for a short time and drift into a daydream or light sleep.
Like when your eyes stay open but your mind goes somewhere else.
It is easy to zone when the lesson goes on too long.
I zoned on the bus and almost missed my stop.
UsagePeople more often say zone out: I zoned out on the bus.
Oppositefocus, concentrate
Note
- 10A way of defending where each player guards an area instead of one player from the other team.
Like guards who each watch one door instead of following one visitor around.
The coach switched to a zone after our fastest defender fouled out.
The defense dropped into a zone, and each player watched his own part of the field.
Note
- 11A band or ring of color or growth that goes all the way around something.
Like a ring of color drawn around a ball.
The crystal has a green zone around its pink center.
Agate often has zones of color that go around in rings.
- 12A named group of computers and printers on an old Apple network.
On our old Apple network, each floor had its own zone.
On old Macs, you picked a zone first and then a printer.
Note
- 13In handball, the marked D-shaped space in front of each goal.
- 14All the internet name records that one authority manages for a domain and the subdomains it has not handed off.
- 15The curved strip on the outside of a ball between two parallel cuts.
- 16The solid piece of a ball that lies between two parallel cuts.
- 17A group of flat crystal faces that all lie parallel to one shared direction.
- 18A belt or band worn around the waist, found mostly in poems and old stories.
- 19A full circle around something, or the line that goes around it.
And we have yet large day; for scarce the sun / Hath finish'd half his journey, and scarce begins / His other half in the great zone of heaven.
1667, John Milton, Paradise LostHere, zone means the full circle the sun travels around the sky.
Showing meanings only.
Practice
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Origin
From Latin zōna, from Greek zṓnē, meaning "belt."
Checked 5 Nov 2026 · 3 facts
- English zone derives from Latin zōna. en.wiktionary.org
- Latin zōna derives from Greek zṓnē. en.wiktionary.org
- Greek zṓnē means belt. en.wiktionary.org