# work out
## English
### Pronunciation

* (UK) IPA: /ˌwɜːk ˈaʊt/
* (US) IPA: /ˌwɝk ˈaʊt/
* Audio (US):(file)

### Verb

work out (third-person singular simple present works out, present participle working out, simple past and past participle worked out)
* (transitive) To calculate.
    Can you work out 250 × 12 in your head for me?
    Can you work out how to get to the university by car?
** 2022 January 12, Sir Michael Holden, “Reform of the workforce or death by a thousand cuts?”, in RAIL, number 948, page 22:You don't have to be Einstein to work out that this level of government subsidy is unsustainable.
* (transitive) To make sense of.
    Synonym: figure out
    I can't work these instructions out.
* (transitive) To decide.
    I can't work out if I like him or not.
* (transitive) To bring about or cause to happen by work or effort.
    Near-synonyms: hash out, hammer out
    I think we can work out a compromise.
** 1886 October – 1887 January, H[enry] Rider Haggard, She: A History of Adventure, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., published 1887, →OCLC:"Ah! if man would but see that hope is from within and not from without - that he himself must work out his own salvation!"
* (transitive) To resolve; to find a solution for.
    Near-synonyms: straighten out, sort out
    They managed to work out their differences.
** 2025 February 3, Tom Phillips, Richard Partington, quoting Donald Trump, “Trump agrees to pause Mexico tariffs as shares tumble over trade war fears”, in The Guardian‎, →ISSN:Trump hinted that Britain might be spared tariffs, saying: “I think that one can be worked out”.
* (transitive) To develop or devise in detail; to elaborate.
    Near-synonyms: plan out, lay out
    to work out a plan
* (transitive) To smooth or perfect.
    Near-synonyms: iron out, smooth out
    This is a beta version; we're still working out the kinks.
* (intransitive) To conclude with the correct solution.
    Near-synonym: add up
    These figures just don't work out.
* (intransitive) To succeed; to result in a satisfactory situation.
    Near-synonym: pan out
    Are you still seeing John? – No, it didn't work out.
** 1962 August, G. Freeman Allen, “Traffic control on the Great Northern Line”, in Modern Railways, page 131:As everyone knows, almost all booked passenger and freight trains are diagrammed into rosters for engines and men, and in an operating Utopia everything would work out daily according to plan.
* (intransitive) To exercise, especially by lifting weights.
    Hyponym: pump iron
    John won't be here for a while because he's working out.
    Wow, you're looking good! Do you work out?
* (transitive) To strengthen a part of one’s body by exercise.
    To work out your core
** 1990 December 9, “Personal advertisement”, in Gay Community News, volume 18, number 21, page 12:Hot, worked-out body and a creative mind possessed by this hunky, handsome, married guy.
* (intransitive, US) To earn a wage working away from one's farm.
** 1918, Willa Cather, chapter 5, in My Ántonia‎, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, page 38:The two Russians made good farmhands, and in summer they worked out together.
** 1939, John Steinbeck, chapter 13, in The Grapes of Wrath‎, New York: Viking, published 1958, page 201:[…] with them good wages, maybe a fella can get hisself a little piece a land an’ work out for extra cash.
* (transitive, intransitive) Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see work,‎ out.
    Using some tweezers, he worked the bee sting out of his hand.
    He works out of a small office shared with three others.
* (mining) To remove all the mineral that can be profitably exploited.
    Coordinate term: peter out
    The gravel pit had been worked out.
    A worked-out chalk pit or quarry

#### Quotations

* 1971, Carol King, “So Far Away”, Tapestry, Ode Records
    If I could only work this life out my way / I’d rather spend it bein' close to you.
* 2009, Reif Larsen, The Selected Works of T.S. Spivet, Penguin Books, page 41:"I have some questions I need to work out. Big questions."

#### Derived terms

* work it out on the remix

#### Related terms

* workout

#### Translations
### See also

* exercise

### References

* “work out”, in OneLook Dictionary Search.
* William Dwight Whitney, Benjamin E[li] Smith, editors (1911), “work out”, in The Century Dictionary […], New York, N.Y.: The Century Co., →OCLC.

### Anagrams

* outwork