Give away or giveaway?
give away is a verb meaning “To make a gift of (something)”; giveaway is a noun meaning “Something that is given away or handed out for free”. Use give away as a verb and giveaway as a noun. give away is written as two words and giveaway as one word; they are used differently.
What is the difference between give away and giveaway?
| give away | giveaway | |
|---|---|---|
| Part of speech | verb, noun | noun, adjective |
| Meaning | To make a gift of (something) informalTo sell very cheaply | Something that is given away or handed out for free An event at which things are given away for free free of charge, at no cost |
| Example | I didn't like that book, so I gave it away | The T-shirt was a giveaway from the company that sells the software |
| Forms | none | giveaways |
| Pronunciation | not recorded | not recorded |
| In writing | not counted (the list counts single words) | 3.5 times per million words |
Sources: give away and giveaway in the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
Every current meaning of give away and giveaway
give away
- 1
To make a gift of (something)
I didn't like that book, so I gave it away
- 2
Alternative form of giveaway
- 3
informalTo sell very cheaply
- 4
To relinquish control over
- 5
To formally hand over a bride to the bridegroom; often by her father
Who giveth away this woman to this man in Holy matrimony?
- 6
To unintentionally reveal a secret or divulge undisclosed information; to betray or expose someone
He gave himself away with a stupid lie
- 7
To concede an advantage in weight, time, height etc
Despite giving away twenty pounds in weight, the challenger found a knock-out blow in the second round
- 8
To concede
giveaway
- 1
Something that is given away or handed out for free
The T-shirt was a giveaway from the company that sells the software
- 2
free of charge, at no cost
- 3
An event at which things are given away for free
- 4
very low
- 5
The act of giving something away for free
- 6
An indicator that makes something obvious or apparent
Near-synonyms: clue, sign, tell
Source: the English Wiktionary, dump of September 2, 2026 (CC BY-SA 4.0); obsolete, archaic, dialect and rare senses left out.
Which is more common, give away or giveaway?
give away is a phrase, which the list of single words does not count; giveaway 3.5 times per million words.
Source: written frequency: wordfreq 3.1 (a 2021 snapshot of Wikipedia, subtitles, news, books, web text and social media).
How many people search give away vs giveaway?
“give away vs giveaway” is searched about 20 times a month on Google and 10 on Bing in the United States. Google counts close variants of a query together (“giveaway vs give away”, “give away or giveaway”).
Sources: Google Ads keyword data through DataForSEO and Microsoft Advertising keyword data through DataForSEO, the average month from September 2025 to August 2026.