downtime

See also: down-time and down time

English

WOTD – 4 September 2023

Etymology

From down (“out of order; out of service; inoperable”) +‎ time.

Pronunciation

• (Received Pronunciation) IPA^(key): /ˈdaʊntaɪm/

• Audio (Southern England):

  (file)

• (General American) IPA^(key): /ˈdaʊnˌtaɪm/
• Hyphenation: down‧time

Noun

downtime (countable and uncountable, plural downtimes)

1. Time lost due to the failure of some system or machinery, such as a computer crash or power outage.

   Antonym: uptime

   Coordinate term: idle time

   • 2017 March 1, Alex Hern, “How did an Amazon glitch leave people literally in the dark?”, in Katharine Viner, editor, The Guardian‎^[1], London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2023-05-30:

     A short internet outage might sound like a trifling matter – don’t we all need a little bit of time offline now and then? – but for many, the pervasiveness of the so-called “internet of things” meant downtime at Amazon affected their physical life as well as their digital one.

2. A period of time when work or other activity is less intense or stops.
   • 2020 November 9, Gwen Ihnat, “With McCartney III, Paul McCartney Offers Lessons from a Legendary Life”, in The A.V. Club‎^[2], archived from the original on 2022-11-07:

     As the world turns inward, trapped inside in various stages of pandemic quarantine, numerous songwriting luminaries (often blessed with their own in-home studios) have tried to use the downtime creatively—from Millennial stars like Taylor Swift and Ariana Grande to longtime veterans like Bruce Springsteen and Elvis Costello.

3. (chiefly Canada, US) A period of time set aside for relaxation and rest; leisure time, free time.

   I’ve been working all weekend. I need some downtime.

   • 2010 August 24, Matt Richtel, “Digital devices deprive brain of needed downtime”, in The New York Times‎^[3], New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2023-05-29:

     But scientists point to an unanticipated side effect: when people keep their brains busy with digital input, they are forfeiting downtime that could allow them to better learn and remember information, or come up with new ideas.

   • 2021 March 19, James Fallows, “Can humans be replaced by machines?”, in The New York Times‎^[4], New York, N.Y.: The New York Times Company, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2023-05-29:

     ‘We need to use the downtime, when things are calm, to prepare for when things get serious in the decades to come,’ he [Demis Hassabis] has said. ‘The time we have now is valuable, and we need to make use of it.’

Alternative forms

• down time, down-time

Translations

amount of time lost due to forces beyond one’s control

• Arabic: فترة التعطيل ?
• Bulgarian: престо́й (bg) m (prestój)
• Chinese:

  Mandarin: 停機時間／停机时间 (tíngjī shíjiān)

• Danish: nedetid (da) c
• Dutch: downtime (nl) ?
• Finnish: häiriöaika, käyttökatko (fi), keskeytysaika, seisokkiaika
• French: pause (fr) f, repos (fr) m, taux d’indisponibilité m, temps d’arrêt m
• German: Downtime f, Ausfallzeit f
• Hungarian: állásidő (hu), állási idő (less common), holtidő (hu), kiesési időtartam, meghibásodási idő, üzemszünet (hu)
• Italian: tempo di fermo m, tempo di riposo m, tempo passivo m
• Japanese: ダウンタイム (dauntaimu)
• Korean: 다운타임 (dauntaim)
• Macedonian: за́стој m (zástoj)
• Maori: wākarioi
• Norwegian:

  Bokmål: nedetid m or f

  Nynorsk: nedetid f

• Persian: زمان اکار (fa)
• Polish: przestój m
• Russian: просто́й (ru) m (prostój), вре́мя просто́я n (vrémja prostója)
• Swedish: avbrottstid ?, nertid c
• Yakut: боростуой (borostuoy) (informal)

period of time when work or other activity is less intense or stops

• Finnish: rauhallisempi aika
• Macedonian: please add this translation if you can

period of time set aside for relaxation and rest — see free time

Further reading

• downtime on Wikipedia.Wikipedia
• “downtime, n.”, in Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary, Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster, 1996–present.