withhold

UK/wɪθˈhəʊld/US/wɪθˈhoʊld/

verbB2+Common in everyday speech and writing · #8,202 of 15,258neutral

Other forms: withheld, withholding, withholds

To withhold is to keep something back that is owed or asked for. Withhold payment, withhold consent, withhold information.

It implies a right to have the thing, which is what makes it an accusation: you can only withhold what somebody was entitled to. The past is withheld. Withholding tax is money taken from a payment at source rather than collected later.

Definitions of withhold

1verbwithholdTo keep something back that is owed or asked for.B2+
“The company withheld his final salary until he returned the laptop.”

withhold is a keeping back.

Where it comes from

Middle English withholden, from with in its old sense of against, plus hold.

Middle English
withholden
English, today
withhold

From Middle English withholden. Equivalent to with + hold.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practise this word

withhold in the wild

The Current Tax Payment Act compelled employers to withhold federal income taxes from workers' paychecks and pay them directly to the government on the workers' behalf.
Current Tax Payment Act of 1943
In most jurisdictions, tax withholding applies to employment income.
Tax withholding
Nothing by mouth is an American medical instruction meaning to withhold food and fluids.
Nothing by mouth
Rather than providing the Copper Inuit with the seals and other marine mammals, she would withhold them.
Arnapkapfaaluk
The 115 m tall dam will withhold a reservoir of 516,500,000 m3.
Lower Kaleköy Dam

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From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.