Kick-off

noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun
  1. 1
    The opening kick of each half of a game of football.

    "The atmosphere at Upton Park before kick-off reflected the palpable tension surrounding the club right now"

  2. 2
    The opening sequence of any event. broadly

    "Duffy, 26, began a campaign for the 9th Suffolk district […] The crowd of approximately 50 people at his kickoff party was overwhelming composed of other young, white gay men."

  3. 3
    The opening sequence of notes in a song, usually played by the song's main instrument, to indicate the beginning of the song.

Synonyms

All synonyms
alphablast offcommencementcreationdawnedge

Example

More examples

"The German and Dutch national teams meet each other today. Kick-off is at 2.30 p.m."

Etymology

Deverbal from kick off.

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