Meaning & use
tread the water
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Meanings
phraseintransitive
Stay upright in deep water by moving your arms and legs, without swimming forward.
Grammar: No object follows: you tread the water, not 'tread it the water'.
Patterns
- tread the water for + time
- tread the water in + place
- keep treading the water
She treaded the water for a few minutes until the boat came back.
If you get tired, roll onto your back instead of trying to tread the water.
The children were told to tread the water near the shallow end.
phraseintransitivefigurative
Make no progress while waiting for a situation to change.
Grammar: Used about people, companies or plans; often followed by 'while' or 'until'.
Patterns
- tread the water while + clause
- tread the water until + clause
- be treading the water
The team has been treading the water for months while the budget is decided.
He took a part-time job and treaded the water until something better appeared.
Without new funding, the project will just tread the water.
Word forms
| third person singular | treads the water |
|---|---|
| past tense | treaded the water |
| past participle | treaded the water |
| -ing form | treading the water |
Common combinations
- tread the water for an hour
- He treaded the water for an hour before a lifeguard spotted him.
- tread the water in the deep end
- Beginners should not tread the water in the deep end.
- keep treading the water
- Keep treading the water and stay calm.
- tread the water while you wait
- We treaded the water while we waited for the ferry.
- learn to tread the water
- Every child should learn to tread the water.
Synonyms and how they differ
- float
- Use 'float' when you rest on the surface without much effort; treading the water needs steady movement of the arms and legs.
- stay afloat
- This is a more general phrase that can also be used about boats or businesses, while treading the water is mainly about a person in water.
- mark time
- This fits the figurative sense of waiting without progress, but it is used about work or plans, not about being in water.
Opposites
Word family
- tread water phrase
- The shorter, very common form of the same expression.
- treading water phrase
- The -ing form, often used figuratively: 'The company is just treading water.'
Commonly confused: tread the water or thread the water? tread the water or wade?
tread the water vs thread the water
'Thread' means to pass carefully through something, so 'thread the water' would suggest moving through it, not staying in one place.
tread the water vs wade
'Wade' means walking through shallow water, so your feet touch the bottom; when you tread the water, the water is too deep to stand in.
Practice
The swimmers were too far from shore, so they ______ the water until the rescue boat arrived.
Choose one answer.
The sentence needs a past-tense verb, and this phrase forms its past tense as 'treaded'. 'Trod' is the past tense of the verb 'tread' meaning to step on something, which does not fit here, and 'treading' would need a helping verb such as 'were'.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “tread the water”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.