Harden

//ˈhɑɹdn̩// name, noun, verb, slang

name, noun, verb, slang ·Common ·High school level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    Alternative form of hurden (“coarse linen”). alt-of, alternative, countable, uncountable
Verb
  1. 1
    To become hard. intransitive

    "The Chief Medical Officer of London Transport believes that public opinion against smoking will harden to the point of a total bar on the Underground, as in other countries."

  2. 2
    cause to accept or become hardened to; habituate wordnet
  3. 3
    To make something hard or harder. ergative, transitive
  4. 4
    make healthy wordnet
  5. 5
    To strengthen. figuratively, transitive

    "In view of the system's relatively low cost, the preferred alternative could be for the military user to avail himself of multiple base stations rather than seeking to harden the base station hardware for defense applications."

Show 8 more definitions
  1. 6
    harden by reheating and cooling in oil wordnet
  2. 7
    To modify (a website or other system) to make it resistant to malicious attacks. transitive
  3. 8
    become hard or harder wordnet
  4. 9
    To become or make (a person or thing) resistant or less sensitive. ambitransitive

    "When thou goest to return into Egypt, see that thou do all those wonders before Pharaoh, which I have put in thine hand: but I will harden his heart, that he shall not let the people go."

  5. 10
    make hard or harder wordnet
  6. 11
    To get an erection. informal, intransitive

    "He hardened as he imagined himself running his hands over her small breasts"

  7. 12
    To become or make (a consonant) more fortis; to (cause to) undergo fortition. ambitransitive
  8. 13
    To unpalatalize or velarize.

    "Of course one needs to keep in mind the fact that *tʹ and *dʹ are hardened before *e and *i in Ukrainian and Rusyn[…]"

Proper Noun
  1. 1
    A surname. countable, uncountable
  2. 2
    A place name:; A suburb in the Metropolitan Borough of Walsall, West Midlands, England (OS grid ref SK0101). countable, uncountable
  3. 3
    A place name:; A village and civil parish (with a village council) in the Metropolitan Borough of Bradford, West Yorkshire, England (OS grid ref SE0838). countable, uncountable
  4. 4
    A place name:; A town in Hilltops council area, southern New South Wales, Australia. countable, uncountable

Synonyms

All synonyms
seasontemperindurateinureinuresteel

Antonyms

All antonyms
soften

Example

More examples

"And so the method that works is treading down the snow to harden it, making blocks and piling them up."

Etymology

From Middle English hardenen, equivalent to hard + -en. Cognate with Danish hærdne (“to harden; cure”), Swedish hårdna (“to harden”), Norwegian herdne (“to harden”), Icelandic harðna (“to harden”).

Related phrases

case hardenhammer-hardenharden offharden one's neckharden someone's heartharden up

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