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Definition spend in British English

spend verb

verb
/spend/

When you use spend with another verb, to talk about how someone uses their time or their money, use the -ing form of the verb, not the infinitive.

✗ Some people spend a lot of time to watch TV during the day.

✓ Some people spend a lot of time watching TV during the day.

✗ Many young people spend the whole day to play online games.

✓ Many young people spend the whole day playing online games.

When ong>spend timeong> or ong>spend moneyong> is followed by a noun, use the preposition on, not ‘for’ or ‘in’:

✗ This money could be spent for other more important things.

✓ This money could be spent on other more important things.

✗ Students should consider their financial situation before they spend their money in goods.

✓ Students should consider their financial situation before they spend their money on goods.

1

to use money to pay for things

Example

How much money did you spend?

Example

We're spending a lot more on food than we used to.

Example

They spent about £600 just rebuilding the front porch.

Synonyms and related words
2

to stay somewhere or to do something for a period of time

Example

We spent the day at the beach.

Example

How much time do you spend on homework?

Example

I'm going to spend Christmas with my family.

Example

I'll need to spend an hour rehearsing with the cast.

Synonyms and related words
3

to use your time, effort, or energy to do something

Synonyms and related words
Definition spend in British English