garbage
Americannoun
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discarded animal and vegetable matter, as from a kitchen; refuse.
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any matter that is no longer wanted or needed; trash.
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a bin or other receptacle for discarded matter, especially kitchen waste; garbage can.
Hey, who threw my leftover pizza in the garbage?
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anything that is contemptibly worthless, inferior, or vile.
There's nothing but garbage on TV tonight.
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worthless talk; lies; foolishness.
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Informal. any unnecessary item added to something else, as for appearance only; garnish.
I'll have an Old Fashioned, but without the garbage.
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useless artificial satellites or parts of rockets floating in space, as satellites that are no longer transmitting information or rocket boosters jettisoned in flight.
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Computers. meaningless or unwanted data.
That program was not properly debugged and produced nothing but garbage.
noun
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worthless, useless, or unwanted matter
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Also called: rubbish. discarded or waste matter; refuse
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computing invalid data
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informal nonsense
Etymology
Origin of garbage
First recorded in 1400–50; Middle English garbage, gabage “discarded parts of butchered fowls; entrails of fowls used for human food”; compare with Middle English garbelage “removal of refuse from spices,” Middle English garbelure “refuse found in spices,” and Old French garbage (also jarbage ) “tax on sheaves of grain,” but the shift of sense here is unclear; further origin uncertain; see also garble, -age
Explanation
If you throw it in the trash, you can call it garbage. Likewise, if something is so terrible you wish you could throw it in the trash, like a really bad movie, you can also call it garbage. Everything in your kitchen trash is garbage — essentially, it's anything that's useless. Garbage can include vegetable scraps, wadded-up paper, or even spoken gibberish. The origin of the word garbage is a little uncertain, though in the 15th century it was used to mean literally "giblets of a fowl," or the extra parts that weren't considered food.
Vocabulary lists containing garbage
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
For more than a year, an uncontrolled fire had burned in the bowels of the dump, broiling old garbage and sending nauseating fumes into nearby homes.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 12, 2026
Justin Gignac, an artist in New York City, collected garbage outside Madison Square Garden on the day of Taylor Swift and Travis Kelce's wedding.
From BBC ● Jul. 9, 2026
His wife, Christi Thomas, held a red Buc-ee’s five-gallon bucket that she called a “redneck garbage can” for their truck.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 9, 2026
A New York artist picked up the garbage last Friday from city streets around Madison Square Garden, where the couple staged a glamorous event for hundreds of celebrity guests amid a global frenzy.
From Barron's ● Jul. 8, 2026
A shuffling and scuffling came from deep in the garbage mound; then Nine and Little Two came tumbling out, one after the other.
From "The Undead Fox of Deadwood Forest" by Aubrey Hartman
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.