Meaning of spend in English

spend

verb

/spend/ uk

/spend/

spent | spent

spend verb (MONEY)

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A2 [ I or T ]

to give money as a payment for something:

How much did you spend?

I don't know how I managed to spend so much in the club last night.

We spent a fortune when we were in New York.

She spends a lot of money on clothes.

We've just spent $1.9 million on improving our computer network.

We went on a spending spree (= we bought a lot of things) on Saturday.

Thesaurus: synonyms, antonyms, and examples

to spend money

spendHow much do you intend to spend on a house?
payWhen you bought the tickets, how much did you pay?
investShe's invested all her savings in the business.
pay outI've just paid out $700 to get the car fixed.
splurgeWe've just splurged on new kitchen appliances.
blowWe won a $15 million settlement in court and we blew it all in six years.

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More examplesFewer examples

It may be fairly cheap to buy, but you've got to take into consideration the money you'll spend on repairs.
The number of staff we can take on will be determined by how much money we're allowed to spend.
I'm meant to be on an economy drive at the moment, so I'm trying not to spend too much.
We are duty bound to justify how we spend our funds.
The council has some spare cash which it proposes to spend on public amenities.

SMART Vocabulary: related words and phrases

Paying money

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spend verb (TIME)

A2 [ T ]

to use time doing something or being somewhere:

I think we need to spend more time together.

I spent a lot of time cleaning that room.

I've spent years building up my collection.

I spent an hour at the station waiting for the train.

How long do you spend on your homework?

My sister always spends ages in the bathroom.

We spent the weekend in Buenos Aires.

You can spend the night here if you like.

More examplesFewer examples

Students learning computer studies spend two days each week in a computer lab and four days in the classroom.
I have to spend three months of the year away from home - but there are compensations like the chance to meet new people.
They were condemned to spend the rest of their lives in prison.
It would be a crime to spend such a beautiful day indoors.
We would spend every meal time entreating the child to eat her vegetables.

SMART Vocabulary: related words and phrases

Spending time & time passing

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spend verb (FORCE)

[ T ]

to use energy, effort, force, etc., especially until there is no more left:

For the past month he's been spending all his energy trying to find a job.

They continued firing until all their ammunition was spent (= there was none of it left).

The hurricane will probably have spent most of its force (= most of its force will have gone) by the time it reaches the northern parts of the country.

Her anger soon spent itself (= stopped).

SMART Vocabulary: related words and phrases

Using and misusing

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Idioms

spend money like water
spend a penny
spend the night together

spend

noun [ S ]

UK informal

/spend/ uk

/spend/

the amount of money that is spent on something:

The total spend on the project was almost a million pounds.

SMART Vocabulary: related words and phrases

Costs & expenses

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spend somethingdoing something

collocation

(also spend something on doing something)

spend somethingdoing something collocation (MONEY)

to pay a particular amount of money to buy something or do something:

She spends lots of money buying useless kitchen gadgets.

We've just spent $1.9 million on improving our computer network.

The city doesn't spend enough on bike lanes.

See

spend verb

SMART Vocabulary: related words and phrases

Paying money

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spend somethingdoing something collocation (TIME)

to use a particular amount of time doing something:

I spend about 15 minutes on doing my make-up.

How long do you spend on your homework?

He decided to retire from full-time employment to spend more time on his charitable work.

See

spend verb

SMART Vocabulary: related words and phrases

Spending time & time passing

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(Definition of spend from the Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary & Thesaurus © Cambridge University Press)

spend | Intermediate English

spend

verb

/spend/

past tense and past participle spent us/spent/

spend verb (MONEY)

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[ I/T ]

to give money as a payment for something:

[ T ] We spent a lot of money on our vacation but we had a great time.

spend verb (TIME)

[ T ]

to use time; to allow time to go past:

It doesn’t look as if you spent very long on your homework.

I’ve spent many years building up my collection.

You can spend the night here if you like (= stay here for the night).

spend verb (FORCE)

[ T ]

to use energy, effort, force, etc., until there is no more left:

For the past month he’s been spending all his energy trying to find a job.

(Definition of spend from the Cambridge Academic Content Dictionary © Cambridge University Press)

spend | Business English

spend

verb

/spend/ us

spent | spent

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[ I or T ]

to give money as a payment for something:

How much did you spend?

spend sth on sth We've just spent €1.9 million on improving our computer network.

We've spent too much money on advertising that isn't working.

We spent a fortune when we were in New York.

[ T ]

to use time doing something or being somewhere:

spend time doing sth They need to spend more time improving customer relations.

spend time on sth I spent a lot of time on that report.

How long do you spend at the computer each day?

spend years/ages I've spent years building up this company.

spend a day/week/year, etc. We spent last weekend working.

[ T ]

to use energy, effort, force, etc., especially until there is no more left:

For the past month he's been spending all his energy trying to find a job.

Examples of spend

spend

Unfortunately, spending so much energy filling what's not there usually causes people to miss what is.

From Huffington Post

Want to spend the workday at home in your pajamas?

From Huffington Post

He also spent time talking to the animals and to his brother sun and sister moon.

From Huffington Post

I'm not a doctor, just the daughter of a victim who has spent a lot of time thinking about this.

From CNN

I spend a lot of time wondering if you know that.

From Huffington Post

I just want to spend time with my family.

From Huffington Post

Of course, there were lots of other things, most too trivial to spend time on.

From Slate Magazine

Lower costs for energy leave consumers with more money to spend on other things.

From TIME

Don't spend too much time at one table.

From San Francisco Chronicle

A middle-income family with kids ages 11, 13 and 16 spends $31,070.

From TIME

It's pretty clear that all these companies are spending a lot of money in cities around the world.

From Fast Company

I spent hours in my bedroom writing, playing albums, and just thinking.

From Huffington Post

We lose so much time that could better be spent actually teaching the kids!

From Washington Post

These examples are from corpora and from sources on the web. Any opinions in the examples do not represent the opinion of the Cambridge Dictionary editors or of Cambridge University Press or its licensors.

What is the pronunciation of spend?