Beats

How to spell beats

5 letters · 1 syllable

How to pronounce beats

What does beats mean?

1. verbStrikes repeatedly, defeats an opponent, or (of a heart) pulses; third-person singular present of 'beat'.
2. nounThe rhythmic pulses of music or a regular series of strokes.

Beats in a sentence

• verb

  She always beats her brother at chess.

• noun

  The dance track had heavy, pulsing beats.

• verb

  His heart beats faster whenever he climbs the stairs.

• noun

  The producer layered new drum beats over the melody.

Where does beats come from?

Language of origin: Germanic

This is the inflected form of the verb and noun 'beat', which descends from the Old English verb 'beatan', meaning 'to strike repeatedly' or 'to pound'. That word came from a Proto-Germanic root that also gave rise to related striking words in the older Scandinavian and German languages. From the literal sense of striking, the meaning branched out: a drummer who strikes a skin produces a rhythmic 'beat', a pulsing heart 'beats', and a person who overcomes a rival 'beats' them, the idea of striking down an opponent surviving in that competitive sense. The added '-s' simply marks the third-person singular present tense of the verb or the plural of the noun. The spelling trap is purely auditory: 'beats' is a perfect homophone of 'beets', the dark red root vegetable, so the two are easily swapped in writing despite their unrelated origins.

How the word is built

• beat (to strike; from Old English beatan)
• -s (third-person singular present / plural marker)