Basic Details
Word: Expired
Part of Speech: Verb
Meaning: Came to an end or stopped being valid after a fixed time, as a ticket, passport or medicine does; in formal writing it can also mean died.
Synonyms: ended, lapsed, finished, run out
Antonyms: renewed, valid, current
How to Spell Expired
Syllables: ex - pired
Tricky part: Students write expierd or exspired. The vowel after p is a single i, and the e of expire comes after the r, just before the d.
Watch out for: expierd, exspired, expird
Memory tip: Fire, tire and expire share the same ire, and each simply adds d: fired, tired, expired.
Usage Examples
Example 1: Check the date on the medicine strip; this one expired last month.
Example 2: My library card expired, so I renewed it at the front desk.
Example 3: The offer on school shoes expired on Sunday.
Fun Fact
Expire comes from the Latin exspirare, to breathe out, so the word first described a dying person's last breath before it was used for tickets and passports.
Practise the CREST Way
Word Connection
Choose the synonym of the word expired as used in the sentence:
Dadi's passport expired last year, so she has applied for a new one before her trip to Dubai.
a) arrived
b) improved
c) opened
d) lapsed
Show answer
d) lapsed. A document that has lapsed is no longer valid, which is what expired means here.
Mingle-Mangle
Unjumble the letters in the sentence to form a meaningful word:
The guard would not let us in because our entry passes had dxipeer at noon.
a) expired
b) expected
c) existed
d) expelled
Show answer
a) expired. Seven letters with a p and an r: expected and expelled are longer, and existed has neither a p nor an r.
Word Cookie
Find the extra letter in the word:
expiered
a) i
b) r
c) e
d) p
Show answer
c) e. Expire ends in ire, so the r comes straight after the i.
Multiple Choice Questions
1. An expiry date is printed on ____.
a) a glass marble
b) a garden wall
c) a wooden chair
d) a bottle of cough syrup
Show answer
d) a bottle of cough syrup
2. In an old novel, the line 'the old man expired' tells us that he ____.
a) died
b) sneezed
c) went away
d) fell asleep
Show answer
a) died
