cache
Americannoun
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a hiding place, especially one in the ground, for ammunition, food, treasures, etc..
She hid her jewelry in a little cache in the cellar.
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anything so hidden.
The enemy never found our cache of food.
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Also called cache storage. Computers. a temporary storage space or memory that allows fast access to data.
Web browser cache;
CPU cache.
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Alaska and Northern Canada. a small shed elevated on poles above the reach of animals and used for storing food, equipment, etc.
verb (used with object)
noun
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a hidden store of provisions, weapons, treasure, etc
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the place where such a store is hidden
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computing a small high-speed memory that improves computer performance
verb
Other Word Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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cachesimple
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cachessimple
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have cachedperfect
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has cachedperfect
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am cachingprogressive
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are cachingprogressive
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is cachingprogressive
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have been cachingperfect progressive
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has been cachingperfect progressive
Past
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cachedsimple
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had cachedperfect
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was cachingprogressive
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were cachingprogressive
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had been cachingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of cache
First recorded in 1585–95; from French, noun derivative of cacher “to hide,” from unattested Vulgar Latin coācticāre “to stow away,” originally, “to pack together,” frequentative of Latin coāctāre, equivalent to Latin coāct(us) “collected” (past participle of cōgere “to collect, compel”) + -icā- formative verb suffix + -re infinitive ending
Explanation
Cache sounds like what it is, a stash, and sometimes people — usually the criminal type — have a cache of stolen cash. Often the phrase "weapons cache" is used of a bunch of hidden guns or weapons that have been hidden or stored away, which is logical, given that the French verb cacher means "to hide." Sometimes things aren’t really hidden but are stored away out of sight for use later. Computers even cache data and directories to retrieve when needed. So a cache is anything from a stash of cash to a store of information on reserve.
Vocabulary lists containing cache
Gimme, Gimme, Gimme
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"The Odyssey" by Homer, Books 8–13
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Computer Science and Technology - Middle School
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Hence her latest caper, which begins with a mission to track down a vintage desk and turns on a dime into a heist tied to a cache of gold.
From Salon ● Aug. 1, 2026
During one e-mail to Epstein released in the files, Siad wrote in badly-spelled English: "In This busyness I feel like fisherman some time I cache quick, some time no fish".
From BBC ● Jul. 22, 2026
Where her previous albums largely drew from a cache of material accumulated across years, Korkejian set out to explore her feelings about her family, their experiences together, and the meaning of home.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 29, 2026
The same hasn’t happened yet for quad-level cell NAND, however, he said, “reflecting ongoing uncertainty around the ultimate configuration of KV cache offloading.”
From MarketWatch ● Jun. 22, 2026
Before Hale obtained the life-insurance policy on Roan, he had attempted to purchase Roan’s headright—his share in the tribe’s mineral trust, which was more precious than any cache of diamonds or gold.
From "Killers of the Flower Moon" by David Grann
And many are dipping into caches of credit-card rewards.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 25, 2026
For now, the Finnish army has no caches of antipersonnel mines.
From Barron's ● Feb. 6, 2026
ProPublica also interviewed more than 100 government and aid officials and reviewed enormous caches of previously unreported memos, correspondence and other documents from inside the Trump administration.
From Salon ● Dec. 16, 2025
Israel said it targeted Hezbollah facilities and weapons caches.
From BBC ● Apr. 10, 2025
“I take it you already possess great caches of treasure. It surprises me that such a meager financial offering as I could supply would entice you to trade.”
From "Fablehaven" by Brandon Mull
A JetBlue spokesperson apologized for the error in an email to MarketWatch and said its fares “are not determined by cached data or other personal information.”
From MarketWatch ● Apr. 20, 2026
Taylor notes that the common ancestor of all North American chickadees cached food.
From Science Daily ● Apr. 17, 2024
Meanwhile, the cached material sits in tubes on Mars.
From Salon ● Mar. 29, 2024
By observing timestamps of the material and searching for previous versions cached online, we know these videos only appeared online recently.
From BBC ● Feb. 15, 2024
His responses were cached and would be sent to Earth with Johanssen's next uplink.
From "The Martian" by Andy Weir
This allows for caching or storing more information in dedicated memory, which makes the agents faster and cheaper because they don’t have to reprocess the same data for every single interaction, according to Salazar.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Feb. 5, 2026
While caching can be thought of as a well-organized closet for a computer, it is difficult to know what should go into that closet when millions of people, with constantly changing needs, are using it.
From Science Daily ● Jan. 24, 2024
The statement added that an announcement over the future of Australia's caching staff would be made "in due course".
From BBC ● Oct. 30, 2023
“Still, I think the possibility of having funerary caching with this antiquity is already stunning,” she said.
From New York Times ● Jun. 5, 2023
That night I could feel another message caching.
From "Feed" by M.T. Anderson
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
