- present participle of warn.
warning
Americannoun
-
warnings
plural
-
the act or utterance of one who warns or the existence, appearance, sound, etc., of a thing that warns.
-
something that serves to warn, give notice, or caution.
We fired a warning at the intruders.
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Meteorology. an announcement from the U.S. National Weather Service alerting the public that a storm or other weather-related hazard is imminent and that immediate steps should be taken to protect lives and property.
adjective
noun
-
a hint, intimation, threat, etc, of harm or danger
-
advice to beware or desist
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an archaic word for notice
adjective
-
(prenominal) intended or serving to warn
a warning look
-
(of the coloration of certain distasteful or poisonous animals) having conspicuous markings, which predators recognize and learn to avoid; aposematic
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of warning
First recorded before 900; Middle English (noun); Old English war(e)nung “precaution”; see warn, -ing 1, -ing 2
Explanation
A warning is a caution against something dangerous. When there's a shark warning at the beach, the lifeguards will order everyone out of the water. When you receive a warning, you get an official advance notice of some impending problem. A crow might caw loudly as a warning when it sees a cat, and a traffic cop might give a first-time speeder a warning instead of an expensive ticket. You can also use warning as an adjective: "The warning light came on in her car as it started to overheat."
Vocabulary lists containing warning
"Encounter"
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"Volcano!"
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Messenger
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
She is coming to the end of her fortnight but, as she helped us into our survival suits, the Met Office issued an amber weather warning for much of Scotland.
From BBC ● Oct. 24, 2026
“The warning and advisories are real. People should take them seriously because conditions are favorable for flooding,” said Doug George, an oceanographer with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 24, 2026
He issued a stern warning, demanding their release.
From Barron's ● Oct. 23, 2026
The Federal Trade Commission also proposed a policy statement in August targeting personalized pricing, warning that retailers using personal data to set custom prices without clear disclosures violate federal law.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 23, 2026
There’s a little less evening now, and that’s a warning.
From "The Teacher’s Funeral" by Richard Peck
In spite of warnings from Cloudflare and AWS that "millions of hacking attempts" had been made every hour, there is also no evidence of large scale data breaches or cyber-attacks.
From BBC ● Oct. 23, 2026
Houthi strikes on Saudi airports led to a string of new warnings over the kingdom’s airspace, leading airlines to scale back in what had become one of two primary corridors left linking Europe and Asia.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 23, 2026
Parents received warnings on those occasions, and their son’s e-motorcycles have been impounded twice, prosecutors said.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 22, 2026
AI chip giant Nvidia's boss Jensen Huang said on Thursday that warnings artificial intelligence could wipe out humanity were "cheap" attempts to grab headlines.
From Barron's ● Oct. 22, 2026
The chill of Mrs. Fairfax’s warnings, and the damp of her doubts were upon me: something of unsubstantiality and uncertainty had beset my hopes.
From "Jane Eyre" by Charlotte Brontë
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Get a wordDefinitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
