• (RP) IPA: /həʊl/, [həʊɫ], [hɒʊɫ]
• (America) IPA: /hoʊl/, [hoʊɫ]

hole (plural holes)

1. A hollow place or cavity; an excavation; a pit; an opening in or through a solid body, a fabric, etc.; a perforation; a rent; a fissure.

   There’s a hole in my shoe.  Her stocking has a hole in it.

   • Bible, 2 Books of Kings xii.9:

     The priest took a chest, and bored a hole in the lid.

   • c. 1606–1607, William Shakespeare, “The Tragedie of Anthonie and Cleopatra”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies: Published According to the True Originall Copies (First Folio), London: Printed by Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, OCLC 606515358 ↗, [Act II, scene vii]:

     To be called into a huge sphere, and not to be seen to move in't, are the holes where eyes should be, which pitifully disaster the cheeks.

   • 1840, Alfred, Lord Tennyson, Godiva (poem):

     […] her palfrey’s footfall shot
     Light horrors thro’ her pulses: the blind walls
     Were full of chinks and holes; and overhead
     Fantastic gables, crowding, stared: […]

   • 1879, R[ichard] J[efferies], chapter II, in The Amateur Poacher, London: Smith, Elder, & Co., […], OCLC 752825175 ↗:

     Orion hit a rabbit once; but though sore wounded it got to the bury, and, struggling in, the arrow caught the side of the hole and was drawn out. Indeed, a nail filed sharp is not of much avail as an arrowhead; you must have it barbed, and that was a little beyond our skill.

   1. An opening in a solid.

      There’s a hole in my bucket.

2. (heading) In games.
   1. (golf) A subsurface standard-size hole, also called cup, hitting the ball into which is the object of play. Each hole, of which there are usually eighteen as the standard on a full course, is located on a prepared surface, called the green, of a particular type grass.
   2. (golf) The part of a game in which a player attempts to hit the ball into one of the holes.

      I played 18 holes yesterday.  The second hole today cost me three strokes over par.

   3. (baseball) The rear portion of the defensive team between the shortstop and the third baseman.

      The shortstop ranged deep into the hole to make the stop.

   4. (chess) A square on the board, with some positional significance, that a player does not, and cannot in future, control with a friendly pawn.
   5. (stud poker) A card (also called a hole card) dealt face down thus unknown to all but its holder; the status in which such a card is.
   6. In the game of fives, part of the floor of the court between the step and the pepperbox.
3. (archaeology, slang) An excavation pit or trench.
4. (figuratively) A weakness; a flaw or ambiguity.

   I have found a hole in your argument.

   • 2011, Fun - We Are Young

     But between the drinks and subtle things / The holes in my apologies, you know / I’m trying hard to take it back

5. (informal) A container or receptacle.

   car hole;  brain hole

6. (physics) In semiconductors, a lack of an electron in an occupied band behaving like a positively charged particle.
7. (computing) A security vulnerability in software which can be taken advantage of by an exploit.
8. (slang, anatomy) An orifice, in particular the anus. When used with shut it always refers to the mouth.

   Just shut your hole!

9. (Ireland, Scotland, particularly in the phrase "get one's hole") Sex, or a sex partner.

   Are you going out to get your hole tonight?

10. (informal, with "the") Solitary confinement, a high-security prison cell often used as punishment.

    Synonyms: box

    • 2011, Ahmariah Jackson, ‎IAtomic Seven, Locked Up but Not Locked Down

      Disciplinary actions can range from a mere write up to serious time in the hole.

11. (slang) An undesirable place to live or visit; a hovel.

    His apartment is a hole!

12. (figurative) Difficulty, in particular, debt.

    If you find yourself in a hole, stop digging.

13. (graph theory) A chordless cycle in a graph.

• See also Thesaurus:hole
• (solitary confinement) administrative segregation, ad-seg, block (UK), box, cooler (UK), hotbox, lockdown, pound, SCU, security housing unit, SHU, special handling unit

• French: creux, trou
• German: Loch
• Italian: buco, pertugio, foro, cunicolo, fessura
• Portuguese: buraco, oco
• Russian: дыра́
• Spanish: hueco, agujero, hoyo

• French: trou
• German: Loch
• Italian: buco
• Portuguese: buraco
• Russian: дыра́
• Spanish: (Spain) agujero, hoyo

• Italian: falla, crepa, debolezza
• Portuguese: furo

• Italian: buca

• French: trou
• Italian: lacuna, lacuna elettronica
• Russian: ды́рка

• French: faille
• Italian: falla
• Portuguese: furo, brecha
• Russian: лазе́йка
• Spanish: agujero, fallo

• French: trou
• Italian: orifizio, pertugio, cavità
• Russian: отве́рстие

• French: trou, mitard
• Italian: cella di isolamento

• Italian: buco, cesso
• Russian: дыра́
• Spanish: zulo, tugurio, covacha, cuartucho, tabuco, zaquizamí

• Spanish: hoyo

hole (holes, present participle holing; past and past participle holed)

1. (transitive) To make holes in (an object or surface).

   Shrapnel holed the ship's hull.

2. (transitive, by extension) To destroy.

   She completely holed the argument.

3. (intransitive) To go into a hole.
4. (transitive) To drive into a hole, as an animal, or a billiard ball or golf ball.
   • 1799, Sporting Magazine (volume 13, page 49)

     If the player holes the red ball, he scores three, and upon holing his adversary's ball, he gains two; and thus it frequently happens, that seven are got upon a single stroke, by caramboling and holing both balls.

   Woods holed a standard three foot putt
5. (transitive) To cut, dig, or bore a hole or holes in.

   to hole a post for the insertion of rails or bars

• French: trouer
• German: lochen
• Portuguese: esburacar
• Russian: дыря́вить

hole (comparative holer, superlative holest)

1. Obsolete form of whole#English|whole.
   • , A grammar of the Icelandic or Old Norse tongue:

     Such was the arrangement of the alphabet over the hole North.