work out
Language: English
Part of speech: verb
Pronunciation: ipa: /ˌwɜːk ˈaʊt/
ipa: /ˌwɝk ˈaʊt/
Forms: form: works out
form: working out
form: worked out
form: worked out
Senses: examples: text: Can you work out 250 × 12 in your head for me?
text: Can you work out how to get to the university by car?
text: You don't have to be Einstein to work out that this level of government subsidy is unsustainable.
ref: 2022 January 12, Sir Michael Holden, “Reform of the workforce or death by a thousand cuts?”, in RAIL, number 948, page 22:
glosses: To calculate.
examples: text: I can't work these instructions out.
synonyms: figure out
glosses: To make sense of.
examples: text: I can't work out if I like him or not.
glosses: To decide.
examples: text: Near-synonyms: hash out, hammer out
text: I think we can work out a compromise.
text: "Ah! if man would but see that hope is from within and not from without - that he himself must work out his own salvation!"
ref: 1886 October – 1887 January, H[enry] Rider Haggard, She: A History of Adventure, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., published 1887, →OCLC:
glosses: To bring about or cause to happen by work or effort.
examples: text: Near-synonyms: straighten out, sort out
text: They managed to work out their differences.
text: Trump hinted that Britain might be spared tariffs, saying: “I think that one can be worked out”.
ref: 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:
glosses: To resolve; to find a solution for.
examples: text: Near-synonyms: plan out, lay out
text: to work out a plan
glosses: To develop or devise in detail; to elaborate.
examples: text: Near-synonyms: iron out, smooth out
text: This is a beta version; we're still working out the kinks.
glosses: To smooth or perfect.
examples: text: Near-synonym: add up
text: These figures just don't work out.
glosses: To conclude with the correct solution.
examples: text: Near-synonym: pan out
text: Are you still seeing John? – No, it didn't work out.
text: 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.
ref: 1962 August, G. Freeman Allen, “Traffic control on the Great Northern Line”, in Modern Railways, page 131:
glosses: To succeed; to result in a satisfactory situation.
examples: text: John won't be here for a while because he's working out.
text: Wow, you're looking good! Do you work out?
glosses: To exercise, especially by lifting weights.
examples: text: To work out your core
text: Hot, worked-out body and a creative mind possessed by this hunky, handsome, married guy.
ref: 1990 December 9, “Personal advertisement”, in Gay Community News, volume 18, number 21, page 12:
glosses: To strengthen a part of one’s body by exercise.
examples: text: The two Russians made good farmhands, and in summer they worked out together.
ref: 1918, Willa Cather, chapter 5, in My Ántonia, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, page 38:
text: […] with them good wages, maybe a fella can get hisself a little piece a land an’ work out for extra cash.
ref: 1939, John Steinbeck, chapter 13, in The Grapes of Wrath, New York: Viking, published 1958, page 201:
glosses: To earn a wage working away from one's farm.
examples: text: Using some tweezers, he worked the bee sting out of his hand.
text: He works out of a small office shared with three others.
glosses: Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see work, out.
examples: text: The gravel pit had been worked out.
text: A worked-out chalk pit or quarry
topics: business
mining
coordinate_terms: peter out
glosses: To remove all the mineral that can be profitably exploited.
Derived terms: work it out on the remix
Related terms: workout
exercise