• IPA: /meɪk/, [meɪkʲ]
• (Canada) IPA: [meːk]

From Middle English maken, from Old English macian, from Proto-West Germanic *makōn, from Proto-Indo-European *meh₂ǵ-.

Related to match.

• Scots mak
• Saterland Frisian moakje
• Western Frisian meitsje
• Dutch maken
• nds-nl maken
• nds-de maken
• German machen
• Danish mage
• Latin mācerō, macer
• Ancient Greek μάσσω

make (makes, present participle making; simple past and past participle made)

1. (transitive) To create.
   1. To build, construct, produce, or originate.

      Synonyms: fabricate, Thesaurus:build

      We made a bird feeder for our yard.

      I'll make a man out of him yet.

      He makes deodorants.

      • 1892, Walter Besant, “Prologue: Who is Edmund Gray?”, in The Ivory Gate […], New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], →OCLC ↗:

        Thus, when he drew up instructions in lawyer language, he expressed the important words by an initial, a medial, or a final consonant, and made scratches for all the words between; his clerks, however, understood him very well.

      • 1913, Joseph C[rosby] Lincoln, chapter VII, in Mr. Pratt’s Patients, New York, N.Y., London: D[aniel] Appleton and Company, →OCLC ↗:

        I made a speaking trumpet of my hands and commenced to whoop “Ahoy!” and “Hello!” at the top of my lungs. […] The Colonel woke up, and, after asking what in brimstone was the matter, opened his mouth and roared “Hi!” and “Hello!” like the bull of Bashan.

   2. To write or compose.

      I made a poem for her wedding.

      He made a will.

   3. To bring about; to effect or produce by means of some action.

      make war

      They were just a bunch of ne'er-do-wells who went around making trouble for honest men.

   4. (religious) To create (the universe), especially (in Christianity) from nothing.

      God made earth and heaven.

      • 1850, [Alfred, Lord Tennyson], In Memoriam, London: Edward Moxon, […], →OCLC ↗, Prologue:

        Thine are these orbs of light and shade;
        ⁠Thou madest Life in man and brute;
        ⁠Thou madest Death; and lo, thy foot
        Is on the skull which thou hast made.

   5. (transitive) To prepare (food); to cook (food).

      I'm making cereal for breakfast. Who wants some?

2. (intransitive, now mostly colloquial) To behave, to act.

   To make like a deer caught in the headlights.

   They made nice together, as if their fight never happened.

   He made as if to punch him, but they both laughed and shook hands.

3. (intransitive) To tend; to contribute; to have effect; with for or against.
   • 1873, Matthew Arnold, Literature and Dogma:

     And all Israel's language about this power, except that it makes for righteousness, is approximate language

   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC ↗, Romans 14:19 ↗:

     Follow after the things which make for peace.

   • c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The First Part of Henry the Fourth, […]”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC ↗, [Act V, scene i]:

     Considerations infinite / Do make against it.

4. To constitute.

   They make a cute couple.

   This makes the third infraction.

   One swallow does not a summer make.

   • 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter V, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC ↗:

     We made an odd party before the arrival of the Ten, particularly when the Celebrity dropped in for lunch or dinner. He could not be induced to remain permanently at Mohair because Miss Trevor was at Asquith, but he appropriated a Hempstead cart from the Mohair stables and made the trip sometimes twice in a day.

   • 1995, Harriette Simpson Arnow: Critical Essays on Her Work, p.46:

     Style alone does not make a writer.

5. (transitive) To add up to, have a sum of.

   Two and four make six.

6. (transitive, construed with of, typically interrogative) To interpret.

   I don’t know what to make of it.

   They couldn't make anything of the inscription.

   What time do you make it?

7. (transitive, usually stressed) To bring into success.

   This company is what made you.

   She married into wealth and so has it made.

   • 1667, John Dryden, Annus Mirabilis: The Year of Wonders, 1666. […], London: […] Henry Herringman, […], →OCLC ↗, (please specify the stanza number):

     who makes or ruins with a smile or frown

8. (ditransitive, second object is an adjective or participle) To cause to be.

   Synonyms: render

   The citizens made their objections clear.

   This might make you a bit woozy.

   Did I make myself heard?

   Scotch will make you a man.

9. To cause to appear to be; to represent as.

   Homer makes Aphrodite the daughter of Zeus, unlike Hesiod who depicted her as born from the sea foam.

   • 1709–1710, Thomas Baker (antiquarian), Reflections on Learning

     He is not that goose and Ass that Valla would make him.

   • 1908, W[illiam] B[lair] M[orton] Ferguson, chapter IV, in Zollenstein, New York, N.Y.: D. Appleton & Company, →OCLC ↗:

     So this was my future home, I thought! Certainly it made a brave picture. I had seen similar ones fired-in on many a Heidelberg stein. Backed by towering hills, […] a sky of palest Gobelin flecked with fat, fleecy little clouds, it in truth looked a dear little city; the city of one's dreams.

10. (ditransitive, second object is a verb) To cause (to do something); to compel (to do something).

    You're making her cry.

    I was made to feel like a criminal.

    • 1892, Walter Besant, chapter III, in The Ivory Gate […], New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], →OCLC ↗:

      In former days every tavern of repute kept such a room for its own select circle, a club, or society, of habitués, who met every evening, for a pipe and a cheerful glass. […] Strangers might enter the room, but they were made to feel that they were there on sufferance: they were received with distance and suspicion.

11. (ditransitive, second object is a verb, can be stressed for emphasis or clarity) To force to do.

    The teacher made the student study.

    Don’t let them make you suffer.

12. (ditransitive, of a fact) To indicate or suggest to be.

    His past mistakes don’t make him a bad person.

13. (transitive, of a bed) To cover neatly with bedclothes.
14. (transitive, US slang, crime, law enforcement) To recognise, identify, spot.

    Synonyms: twig, notice, Thesaurus:identify

    • 1939, Raymond Chandler, The Big Sleep, Penguin, published 2011, page 33:

      I caught sight of him two or three times and then made him turning north into Laurel Canyon Drive.

    • 2004, George Nolfi et al., Ocean's Twelve, Warner Bros. Pictures, 0:50:30:

      Linus Caldwell: Well, she just made Danny and Yen, which means in the next 48 hours the three o' your pictures are gonna be in every police station in Europe.

    • 2007 May 4, Andrew Dettmann et al., "Under Pressure", episode 3-22 of Numb3rs, 00:01:16:

      David Sinclair: (walking) Almost at Seventh; I should have a visual any second now. (rounds a corner, almost collides into Kaleed Asan) Damn, that was close.
      Don Eppes: David, he make you?
      David Sinclair: No, I don't think so.

15. (transitive, colloquial) To arrive at a destination, usually at or by a certain time.

    We should make Cincinnati by 7 tonight.

    • 1650, Thomas Browne, Pseudodoxia Epidemica: […], 2nd edition, London: […] A[braham] Miller, for Edw[ard] Dod and Nath[aniel] Ekins, […], →OCLC ↗:

      They that sail in the middle can make no land of either side.

16. (intransitive, colloquial) To proceed (in a direction).

    They made westward over the snowy mountains.

    Make for the hills! It's a wildfire!

    They made away from the fire toward the river.

17. (transitive) To cover (a given distance) by travelling. [from 16^thc.]
    • 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter II, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC ↗:

      I had occasion […] to make a somewhat long business trip to Chicago, and on my return […] I found Farrar awaiting me in the railway station. He smiled his wonted fraction by way of greeting, […], and finally leading me to his buggy, turned and drove out of town. I was completely mystified at such an unusual proceeding.

    • 1918 September–November, Edgar Rice Burroughs, “The Land That Time Forgot”, in The Blue Book Magazine, Chicago, Ill.: Story-press Corp., →OCLC ↗; republished as chapter VIII, in Hugo Gernsback, editor, Amazing Stories, (please specify |part=I to III), New York, N.Y.: Experimenter Publishing, 1927, →OCLC ↗:

      I made over twenty miles that day, for I was now hardened to fatigue and accustomed to long hikes, having spent considerable time hunting and exploring in the immediate vicinity of camp.

18. (transitive) To move at (a speed). [from 17^thc.]

    The ship could make 20 knots an hour in calm seas.

    This baby can make 220 miles an hour.

19. To appoint; to name.
20. (transitive, slang) To induct into the Mafia or a similar organization (as a made man).
    • 1990, Nicholas Pileggi, Martin Scorsese, Goodfellas:

      Jimmy Conway: They're gonna make him.
      Henry Hill: Paulie's gonna make you?

21. (intransitive, colloquial, euphemistic) To defecate or urinate.
22. (transitive) To earn, to gain (money, points, membership or status).

    They hope to make a bigger profit.

    He didn't make the choir after his voice changed.

    She made ten points in that game.

23. (transitive) To pay, to cover (an expense); chiefly used after expressions of inability.
    • 1889 May 1, Chief Justice George P. Raney, Pensacola & A. R. Co. v. State of Florida (judicial opinion), reproduced in The Southern Reporter, Volume 5, West Publishing Company, p.843 ↗:

      Whether, […], the construction of additional roads […] would present a case in which the exaction of prohibitory or otherwise onerous rates may be prevented, though it result in an impossibility for some or all of the roads to make expenses, we need not say; no such case is before us.

24. (obsolete, intransitive) To compose verses; to write poetry; to versify.
    • ca.1360-1387, William Langland, Piers Plowman

      to solace him some time, as I do when I make

25. To enact; to establish.
    • 1791, The First Amendment to the United States Constitution:

      Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

26. To develop into; to prove to be.

    She'll make a fine president.

27. To form or formulate in the mind.

    make plans

    made a questionable decision

28. To perform a feat.

    make a leap

    make a pass

    make a u-turn

29. (intransitive) To gain sufficient audience to warrant its existence.

    In the end, my class didn't make, which left me with a bit of free time.

30. (obsolete) To act in a certain manner; to have to do; to manage; to interfere; to be active; often in the phrase to meddle or make.
    • c. 1597 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Merry Wiues of Windsor”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC ↗, [Act I, scene iv]:

      a scurvy, jack-a-nape priest to meddle or make

31. (obsolete) To increase; to augment; to accrue.
32. (obsolete) To be engaged or concerned in.
    • 1681, John Dryden, The Spanish Fryar: Or, the Double Discovery. […], London: […] Richard Tonson and Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC ↗, (please specify the page number):

      Gomez, what makest thou here, with a whole brotherhood of city bailiffs?

33. (now, archaic) To cause to be (in a specified place), used after a subjective what.
    • 1676, George Etherege, A Man of Mode:

      Footman. Madam! Mr. Dorimant!
      Lov. What makes him here?

    • 1816, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Christabel:

      What makes her in the wood so late, / A furlong from the castle gate?

34. (transitive, euphemism) To take the virginity of.
    • 1896, Rudyard Kipling, The Ladies:

      I was a young un at 'Oogli,
      Shy as a girl to begin;
      Aggie de Castrer she made me,
      — An' Aggie was clever as sin;
      Older than me, but my first un —
      More like a mother she were
      Showed me the way to promotion an' pay,
      An' I learned about women from 'er!

35. (transitive) To have sexual intercourse with.

    Synonyms: Thesaurus:copulate with

36. (intransitive) Of water, to flow toward land; to rise.
    • 1899 February, Joseph Conrad, “The Heart of Darkness”, in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, volume CLXV, number M, New York, N.Y.: The Leonard Scott Publishing Company, […], →OCLC ↗, part I, page 193 ↗:

      The flood had made, the wind was nearly calm, and being bound down the river, the only thing for us was to come to and wait for the turn of the tide.

• French: faire
• German: machen, bauen
• Italian: fare
• Portuguese: fazer, construir
• Russian: де́лать
• Spanish: hacer, artificiar

• German: machen, produzieren
• Portuguese: fazer
• Spanish: producir, elaborar, confeccionar

• French: faire, créer
• German: machen
• Portuguese: fazer
• Russian: де́лать
• Spanish: hacer, crear

• Spanish: formar

• Portuguese: fazer
• Spanish: hacer

• German: machen, interpretieren
• Portuguese: interpretar
• Spanish: hacer

• German: machen
• Portuguese: fazer
• Spanish: hacer

• French: rendre
• German: machen
• Italian: rendere
• Portuguese: fazer, deixar
• Spanish: hacer

• French: faire
• German: lassen, bringen
• Italian: fare
• Portuguese: fazer
• Spanish: hacer

• German: lassen, zwingen
• Portuguese: fazer
• Russian: заставля́ть
• Spanish: obligar

• German: machen
• Portuguese: fazer
• Spanish: hacer

• German: machen

• French: gagner
• Portuguese: ganhar
• Spanish: ganar, cobrar, hacer, devengar

make (plural makes)

1. Brand or kind; model.

   Synonyms: type, manufacturer

   What make of car do you drive?

2. Manner or style of construction (style of how a thing is made); form.
3. Origin (of a manufactured article); manufacture; production.
   • 1904–1905, Baroness Orczy [i.e., Emma Orczy], “The Ayrsham Mystery ↗”, in The Case of Miss Elliott, London: T[homas] Fisher Unwin, published 1905, →OCLC ↗; republished as popular edition, London: Greening & Co., 1909, OCLC 11192831 ↗, quoted in The Case of Miss Elliott (ebook no. 2000141h.html), Australia: Project Gutenberg of Australia, February 2020:

     The cane was undoubtedly of foreign make, for it had a solid silver ferrule at one end, which was not English hall–marked.

   • 1914, Judicious Advertising, page 158:

     The Royal Typewriter Company is distributing a very attractive eight page folder, announcing the Royal Number 10, the first machine of Royal make which uses levers instead of wires to operate the type-bars.

   The camera was of German make.

4. A person's character or disposition.
5. (dated) The act or process of making something, especially in industrial manufacturing.

   Synonyms: making, manufacture, manufacturing, production

6. (uncountable) Quantity produced, especially of materials.

   Synonyms: production, output

7. (computing) A software utility for automatically building large applications, or an implementation of this utility.
8. (slang) Identification or recognition (of identity), especially from police records or evidence.

   Synonyms: ID

9. (slang, military) A promotion.
10. A home-made project.
11. (cards) Turn to declare the trump for a hand (in bridge), or to shuffle the cards.
    • 1962 (edition), Leo Tolstoy, Hadji Murat: A Tale of the Caucasus:

      'Not your make,' said the adjutant sternly and started dealing the cards with his white be-ringed hands as though he was in haste to get rid of them.

12. (basketball) A made basket.
13. (physics) The closing of an electrical circuit.

    Synonyms: completion, actuation

    Antonyms: break

• match

• French: marque
• German: Fabrikat, Marke
• Italian: marca
• Portuguese: marca
• Russian: ма́рка
• Spanish: marca

From Middle English make, imake, ȝemace, from Old English ġemaca, from Proto-West Germanic *gamakō, from Proto-Germanic *gamakô, from Proto-Indo-European *maǵ-.

Cognate with Icelandic maki, Swedish make, Danish mage. Doublet of match.

make (plural makes)

1. (slang, usually in phrase "easy make") Past, present or future target of seduction (usually female).
2. (UK, dialectal) Mate; a spouse or companion; a match.
   • 1590, Edmund Spenser, “Book I, Canto VII”, in The Faerie Queene. […], London: […] [John Wolfe] for William Ponsonbie, →OCLC ↗:

     Th'Elfe therewith astownd, / Vpstarted lightly from his looser make, / And his vnready weapons gan in hand to take.

   • 1678 (later reprinted: 1855), John Ray, A Hand-book of Proverbs:

     Every cake hath its make; but a scrape cake hath two.

make (plural makes)

1. (Scotland, Ireland, Northern England, now, rare) A halfpenny. [from 16th c.]
   • 1934, Lewis Grassic Gibbon, Grey Granite, Polygon 2006 (A Scots Quair), page 606:

     Only as he climbed the steps did he mind that he hadn't even a meck upon him, and turned to jump off as the tram with a showd swung grinding down to the Harbour […]

Origin unclear.

make (plural makes)

1. (East Anglia, Essex, obsolete) An agricultural tool resembling a scythe, used to cut (harvest) certain plants such as peas, reeds, or tares.
   • 1797, Arthur Young, General View of the Agriculture of the County of Suffolk: Drawn Up for the Consideration of the Board of Agriculture and Internal Improvement, page 73:

     Harvest.—When left for seed, they are cut and wadded as pease, with a make.
     Produce.—From three to six sacks an acre.

   • 1811, William Gooch, General view of the agriculture of the county of Cambridge; drawn up for the consideration of the Board of Agriculture and Internal Improvement, page 142, section VI "Pease":

     Harvest. Taken up by a pease-make, and left in small heaps, and turned as often as the weather may make it necessary.