excise
1 Americannoun
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an internal tax or duty on certain commodities, as liquor or tobacco, levied on their manufacture, sale, or consumption within the country.
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a tax levied for a license to carry on certain employments, pursue certain sports, etc.
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British. the branch of the civil service that collects excise taxes.
verb (used with object)
verb (used with object)
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to expunge, as a passage or sentence, from a text.
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to cut out or off, as a tumor.
noun
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Also called: excise tax. a tax on goods, such as spirits, produced for the home market
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a tax paid for a licence to carry out various trades, sports, etc
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that section of the government service responsible for the collection of excise, now part of HMRC
verb
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to delete (a passage, sentence, etc); expunge
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to remove (an organ, structure, or part) surgically
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of excise1
1485–95; apparently < Middle Dutch excijs, variant of accijs < Medieval Latin accīsa tax, literally, a cut, noun use of feminine past participle of Latin accīdere to cut into, equivalent to ac- ac- + cīd-, variant stem of caedere to cut + -ta feminine past participle suffix, with dt > s
Origin of excise2
First recorded in 1570–80; from Latin excīsus “cut out, hewn down,” past participle of excīdere “to excide ”
Explanation
An excise tax is a special tax levied on specific products sold within a country. To excise something can also mean to get rid of it. Say, wouldn't it be nice if they would excise the excise taxes? An excise tax is simply an extra tax put on various products. Perhaps the most common examples are the taxes levied on tobacco and liquor, often called "sin taxes" because drinking and smoking are considered vices. There is also an excise tax on gasoline. To cover the tax, the seller will usually raise the price of the item. Interestingly, the word excise (ek-SIZE) used as a verb means to remove something by cutting it out. Good luck with excising the excise taxes!
Vocabulary lists containing excise
The Vocabulary.com Top 1000
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The Constitution of the United States
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2015 Spelling Bee - Words from Round 2
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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:
They did that because they don’t face the same excise tax on those fees that they do on fares.
From Slate ● May 12, 2026
On Monday he resurrected the hoary idea of suspending the 18.4-cent-a-gallon federal excise tax on gas.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 11, 2026
The Irish government has in recent months cut excise duty on diesel and petrol but the latest package of measures is aimed at hauliers, farmers, agricultural contractors and fishers.
From BBC ● Apr. 29, 2026
State‑run retailers have yet to raise pump prices, with the government instead cutting excise duties on fuel.
From Barron's ● Apr. 26, 2026
Now he could no more excise it from his brain cells than he could sever his past from his future.
From "Typical American" by Gish Jen
This is a film McElwee feels compelled to make, as if it were something living inside of him that had to be excised by any means necessary.
From Salon ● Jul. 24, 2026
The movie is more condensed than the novel; Hitchcock accepted that the film medium cannot access the inner thoughts of a human being, and so significant swaths of the book were excised.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 10, 2026
There’s also a post-credits “Fortnite”-style cartoon of an earlier excised character, Gogo Yubari’s sister Yuki, who Tarantino was right to delete the first time.
From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 5, 2025
These excised lines from the Farewell Address serve not only as a warning but as a prescient prophecy of the political turmoil and factionalism that would later shape the nation’s history.
From Slate ● Feb. 17, 2025
If gemmules existed, then a mouse with a surgically excised tail should produce a mouse without a tail.
From "The Gene" by Siddhartha Mukherjee
They’re dead-set on excising any shagginess that doesn’t fit their hidebound worldview, attacking textbooks and museums that dare to push beyond a straightforward explanation.
From Salon ● Jul. 23, 2026
This statue yassifies Trump, sucking out his buccal fat, virilizing his features, carefully excising all of the dainty feyness that, whether he likes it or not, is crucial to capturing the unique Trump disposition.
From Slate ● Jun. 2, 2026
You will respect your stepdaughter’s position by excising her from the trust, while ensuring you don’t leave a lot of swag for your stepson to squander.
From MarketWatch ● Dec. 20, 2025
In a fast-changing economy, businesses are automating some entry-level roles and excising middle layers of their org charts.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Nov. 13, 2025
It is liable to be accidentally divided in excising malignant or tuberculous glands in the neck.
From Manual of Surgery Volume Second: Extremities—Head—Neck. Sixth Edition. by Miles, Alexander
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.
