Downsize

//ˈdaʊnsaɪz// verb

verb ·Uncommon ·Advanced level

Definitions

Verb
  1. 1
    To reduce in size or number. intransitive

    "Joe and Edna moved to a bungalow after deciding to downsize when the children had left home."

  2. 2
    (of a company) reduce in size or number of employees wordnet
  3. 3
    To reduce the workforce of. transitive

    "They downsized the division by offering attractive early-retirement packages and selling off an office building."

  4. 4
    design or manufacture in a smaller size wordnet
  5. 5
    To terminate the employment of. euphemistic, transitive

    "Joe got downsized and became a plumber."

Show 1 more definition
  1. 6
    dismiss from work wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms
axecandecruitdehirediscarddischarge

Antonyms

All antonyms
upsize

Example

More examples

"Tom did his darndest to try and convince his mother to downsize into a smaller house after his father died."

Etymology

From down- + size.

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.