YESTERDAY Definition & Usage Examples | Dictionary.com

yesterday

[ yes-ter-dey, -dee ]
See synonyms for yesterday on Thesaurus.com
adverb
  1. on the day preceding this day.

  2. a short time ago: Yesterday your money went further.

noun
  1. the day preceding this day.

  2. time in the immediate past.

adjective
  1. belonging or pertaining to the day before or to a time in the immediate past: yesterday morning.

Origin of yesterday

1
before 950; Middle English; Old English geostran dæg.See yester-, day

Other words from yesterday

  • yes·ter·day·ness, noun

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use yesterday in a sentence

  • There was nothing to live for, neither cheerful yesterdays nor confident to-morrows.

  • Youth the divine, half way down the stair of misty yesterdays, turned upon his heel and came back to him.

    Audrey | Mary Johnston
  • Nothing worried her very long and she had the philosophy of a young child, taking no thought of the yesterdays or of the morrows.

  • Her face shone, and all the weariness of the days work, and all the toilsome yesterdays, disappeared from her brow.

    Aunt Crete's Emancipation | Grace Livingston Hill
  • Five seconds after she went to sleep, Sue was reliving one of her yesterdays.

    The Duck-footed Hound | James Arthur Kjelgaard

British Dictionary definitions for yesterday

yesterday

/ (ˈjɛstədɪ, -ˌdeɪ) /


noun
  1. the day immediately preceding today

  2. (often plural) the recent past

adverb
  1. on or during the day before today

  2. in the recent past

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Other Idioms and Phrases with yesterday

yesterday

see not born yesterday.

The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary Copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.