cut out

• Audio (AU)

  (file)

cut out (third-person singular simple present cuts out, present participle cutting out, simple past and past participle cut out)

1. Used other than with a figurative or idiomatic meaning: see cut,‎ out. To separate into parts with or as if with a sharp-edged instrument; sever.

   Cut out the letters and paste them on the poster.

2. (transitive) To refrain from (doing something, using something etc.), to stop/cease (doing something).

   He had to cut out smoking in order to be prepared for the marathon

   She kept clicking her heels. He told her to cut it out.

   • 1906, Princeton Alumni Weekly (volume 7, page 210)

     Hockey is an exciting and healthful form of exercise, well suited to college students, but if it is to retain favor the intercollegiate league should cut out the muckerism which has attended its contests on the ice in recent years.

   • Steven Wright jokes:

     I have a switch in my apartment that doesn't do anything. Every once in a while I turn it on and off. One day I got a call from a woman in France who said "Cut it out!"

3. (transitive) To remove, omit.

   If we cut out the middle-man, we will both have better profits.

4. (transitive) To oust, to replace.
5. (transitive) To separate from a herd.

   The cowboy cut out the unbranded heifers.

6. (intransitive) To stop working, to switch off; (of a person on the telephone etc.) to be inaudible, be disconnected.

   It was around then that the engine suddenly cut out.

   Can you say that again? You keep cutting out.

7. (intransitive) To leave suddenly.

   He must have cut out of the party.

8. (usually in passive) To arrange.

   He has his work cut out for him.

9. (transitive) To intercept.
   • 2011 January 12, Saj Chowdhury, “Liverpool 2 - 1 Liverpool”, in BBC‎:

     As lax as the visitors' defence was, Blackpool's backline was solid. In the first half the Seasiders cut out final balls to Meireles, one of Liverpool's best players, on two occasions and after the break the brilliant Craig Cathcart got enough on his headed clearance to prevent Torres from planting into the net at the far post.

• In all senses the object can come before or after out. If the object is a pronoun, it MUST come before out.

cut out (comparative more cut out, superlative most cut out)

1. (idiomatic) Well suited; appropriate; fit for a particular activity or purpose.

   I'm not really cut out for camping outdoors. I'm allergic to mosquito bites.

   We've got our work cut out for us.

Most commonly found in negative constructions, such as "not cut out for ...".

• cut it out
• have one's work cut out for one

• cut out at OneLook Dictionary Search

• outcut