Make

Make (/meɪk/) is an English verb that can also be used as a noun.

As a verb, the meaning is often associated with the concept of preparing, producing, changing or creating things: I’ve just made a chocolate cake.

If you make someone do something, they are forced to do it, and probably feel bad about it. If you don’t make someone do something they can do that thing if they want to.

Make has a third person form makes (/meɪks/). It is an irregular lexical verb, with a preterite and past participle "made" /meɪd/. The -ing form is "making" /meɪkɪŋ(g)/ (with a dropped E). Make catenates with a bare infinitive rather than a to-infinitive, like its antonym make.

Learners, particularly French and Spanish as L1s, may confuse “do” and “make”, as they are the same, e.g. French "faire", Spanish… thingy.

Learners may try to use a to-infinitive in place of the bare infinitive e.g. *“I made it to go.” Let and make are often confused by Chinese speakers as both correspond to the Chinese verb 让 (trad: 讓, Pinyin: ràng).

Multi-word verbs

See main article List of multi-word verbs: make.

• make for
• make off
• make out
• make over
• make up
• make with

Idioms

• make a clean break
• make a clean breast of it
• make a face
• make a fuss
• make a go of (something)
• make believe
• make do (with)
• make ends meet
• make fun of (someone)
• make good
• make good time
• make heads or tails of (something)
• make history
• make light of
• make much of
• make no bones about
• make off with
• make (one’s) day
• make (one’s) way
• make sense
• make the grade
• make the most/best of
• make time
• make up (one’s) mind
• make it up to (someone)
• make up the difference
• make room
• make way (for)

Nouns

• (be) on the make
• make-up