black hole

noun

1

: a celestial object that has a gravitational field so strong that light cannot escape it and that is believed to be created especially in the collapse of a very massive star

2

: something resembling a black hole: such as

a

: something that consumes a resource continually

a financial black hole

b

: an empty space : void

… the archives of the past few years are a black hole.

—David Herman

c

: a dark and seemingly inescapable state or situation

the black hole of depression

Synonyms

• blank
• blankness
• emptiness
• vacancy
• vacuity
• void

Examples of black hole in a Sentence

discovered that there was a black hole in the library's collection with regard to her topic

Recent Examples on the Web

In the 1970s, Stephen Hawking discovered that black holes aren't entirely black. —Paul Sutter, Space.com, 8 Apr. 2025

The prudent thing to do when a bust arises is to get rid of that project as quickly as possible and with as little pain as possible, yet blind hope will keep them throwing money good money into what is quickly becoming a bad money black hole. —Jay Adkisson, Forbes.com, 7 Apr. 2025

The new data release could also help astrophysicists better understand how galaxies and black holes evolve and the nature of dark matter. —Ashley Strickland, CNN Money, 2 Apr. 2025

Astronomers may have discovered a means to reveal supermassive black holes currently hidden from us across the universe. —Ron Estes, MSNBC Newsweek, 28 Mar. 2025

Word History

First Known Use

1964, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Rhymes for black hole

• bankroll
• bedroll
• borehole
• cajole
• catchpole
• charcoal
• condole
• control
• dipole
• downhole
• enroll
• extol

Kids Definition

black hole

noun

: an invisible region believed to exist in space having a very strong gravitational field and thought to be caused by the collapse of a star