Reverse means to go backward or to turn something around to face the opposite direction. When you put a car in reverse, it moves backward instead of forward. When you reverse the order of a line, the person who was last becomes first.

The word captures any kind of flip or turnaround. A judge might reverse an earlier decision, changing from guilty to not guilty or from yes to no. In a game, you might reverse your fortunes by coming back from behind to win. A magician who reverses a card trick makes things return to how they started.

Reverse can also describe the opposite side of something. The reverse side of a coin shows tails instead of heads. The reverse of a painting shows the back of the canvas instead of the picture.

You might hear someone talk about reverse psychology, a technique where you suggest the opposite of what you actually want, hoping the other person will disagree and do what you wanted all along. If your little brother refuses to clean his room, you might say “I bet you can't clean your room in 10 minutes,” challenging him to prove you wrong.

When something happens in reverse, it goes backward: a movie playing in reverse shows people walking backward and objects flying up into hands instead of falling down.