noun
garbage
GAH-bihj
noun
1
Waste material, especially food scraps and household rubbish, thrown away as useless.
"Take the garbage out before the truck comes on Tuesday."
"The bins were overflowing with garbage after the festival."
2
Nonsense, or something of very poor quality.
"Critics called the sequel absolute garbage."
How to Use Garbage
Learner’s notes
UK vs US
"Garbage" is standard American English; British English usually says "rubbish" instead, though "garbage" is understood everywhere.
Common pairings
garbage can
garbage collector
talk garbage
Word Forms
garbaged past tense, garbages singular
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Take the _____ out before the truck comes on Tuesday.
Etymology
Originally meant the waste parts of a butchered animal, from Anglo-Norman via Old French garber, "to clean up or refine" — the sense later widened to any rubbish.