garbage

noun

gar·​bage ˈgär-bij 

1

a

: food waste

b

: discarded or useless material

2

a

: trash sense 1b

b

: inaccurate or useless data

Synonyms of garbage

• trash
• debris
• rubbish
• junk
• dust
• litter
• sewage
• truck

Examples of garbage in a Sentence

The park was littered with garbage.

Please take out the garbage.

Raccoons were going through the garbage.

Throw the can in the garbage.

If you ask me, what he said is a bunch of garbage.

Recent Examples on the Web

Amazon had sent her a photo showing that her packages had been delivered, but her Ring camera shows a person with a large garbage bag walking away. —Paul Burton, CBS News, 12 Dec. 2025

Piles of garbage and sewage cascaded like waterfalls. —Arkansas Online, 12 Dec. 2025

In response, Watts emptied his garbage bag and sent a full supply of dirty tennis balls spilling and bouncing across the dayroom. —Lizz Schumer, PEOPLE, 12 Dec. 2025

Investigators followed DeAngelo around to try to collect some of his DNA until finally deciding to have a law enforcement officer pose as a garbage collector and lined the garbage truck with plastic before taking DeAngelo’s trash, Ho said. —Camryn Dadey, Sacbee.com, 10 Dec. 2025

Word History

Etymology

Middle English, "poultry organs and body parts used for food, poultry refuse," borrowed from Anglo-French *garbage (implied in sergant garbagere "kitchen servant tasked with plucking and cleaning poultry"), of obscure origin

Note: On morphological, semantic, or chronological grounds unlikely to be related to Anglo-French garbeler, Middle English garbelen "to remove (impurities) from spices" (see garble entry 1) or to Middle French gaburge, grabuge "quarrel, brawl." The Anglo-French collocation sergant garbagere indicates currency of the word as early as 1318 (Household Ordinances of Edward II).

First Known Use

15th century, in the meaning defined at sense 1a

Phrases Containing garbage

• a lot of garbage/nonsense
• garbage can
• garbage disposal
• garbage time
• garbage truck

Kids Definition

garbage

noun

gar·​bage ˈgär-bij 

1

: food waste

2

: discarded or useless material : refuse

3

: something inferior, worthless, or useless

a show that's garbage