close out

present singular third person closes out · participle present closing out · participle past closed out · past closed out

1. transitiveTo terminate; to call the end of.

   Lisicki recovered quickly enough and broke once again at 1-1, using her heavy to serve to dominate before a sweetly-struck backhand down the line closed out the set after 43 minutes.

   2011 June 28, Piers Newbery, “Wimbledon 2011: Sabine Lisicki beats Marion Bartoli”, in BBC Sport

2. transitivebusinessSynonym of close (“to make a sale”).

   Sales people are taught how to close out the deal. Buyers are less well trained but protect themselves with processes that stop the seller from reaching this stage.

   2017, Paul T. Steele, Tom Beasor, Business Negotiation: A Practical Workbook

   Synonyms: close

3. intransitiveTo settle, to pay what is due.

   Much to the dismay of bartenders, many 20-somethings prefer to close out and pay after every drink, no matter how many beverages they end up ordering.

   2025 May 31, Paula Mejía, “Gen Z Doesn’t Want to Start a Bar Tab”, in The New York Times, New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC

   1 more example

   WYCA members are also expected to approve an extra £1.4m in development funding, which would help "close out outstanding legacy issues and allow the project to be remobilised".

   2026 January 21, “Long-delayed White Rose station to be completed”, in RAIL, number 1053, page 8

4. hobbiesTo break all at once, instead of progressively along its length.

   You either want to land on the top of the wave (if it has closed out), or in the transition

   2005, Pete Devries, “PD's Trick Tips”, in Surfing Vancouver Island, archived from the original on 11 May 2006

5. computingTo terminate a computer program.

   Antonyms: open up

6. transitiveTo exclude by blocking all opportunities to enter or join.

   Gerrard plainly had other ideas as he set off on that final, driving run into the opposition penalty area, slaloming between Kamil Glik and Grzegorz Wojtkowiak and getting his shot away as a third defender, Artur Jedzejczyk, and the goalkeeper, Wojciech Szczesny, tried to close him out.

   2013 October 15, Daniel Taylor, “Steven Gerrard goal against Poland ensures England will go to World Cup”, in The Guardian

7. businessTo make trades offsetting an existing position, leaving the trader with a neutral position.
8. space flightTo seal off.

   One week later, the new Tracking and Data Relay Satellite (TDRS-C) was loaded on Discovery and the payload bay doors were cleared and closed out.

   2008, R. Michael Gordon, The Space Shuttle Program: How NASA Lost Its Way, page 192