put

present singular third person puts · participle present putting · UK dialectal participle past putten · archaic present second person singular puttest · archaic past second person singular puttedst · present singular third person puts · archaic present singular third person putteth · participle present putting · alternative obsolete putt

1. To physically place (something or somebody, in, at, around, etc. someplace)

   The police put him in a cell.

   4 more examples

   She put her books on the table.

   They put the new motorway right through the national park.

   Philander went into the next room[…]and came back with a salt mackerel that dripped brine like a rainstorm. Then he put the coffee pot on the stove and rummaged out a loaf of dry bread and some hardtack.

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

   ‘No. I only opened the door a foot and put my head in. The street lamps shine into that room. I could see him. He was all right. Sleeping like a great grampus. Poor, poor chap.’

   1963, Margery Allingham, chapter 20, in The China Governess: A Mystery, London: Chatto & Windus, →OCLC

   Synonyms: locate

2. To place in abstract; to attach or attribute; to assign.

   Don't put the blame on me.

   5 more examples

   The government put restrictions on vehicle imports.

   I put £100 on the winning horse.

   What answer did you put for question 3?

   to put a wrong construction on an act or expression

   That seems like a bad idea put against the restrictions we're working under.

3. To bring or set (into a certain relation, state or condition).

   Put your house in order!

   5 more examples

   He is putting all his energy into this one task.

   She tends to put herself in dangerous situations.

   The doctor's put me on a strict diet.

   Put the following sentences into the past tense.

   put to bed; put to shame; put to death; put into practice; put one's mind to it

4. To express (something in a certain manner).

   To put it bluntly, he's an idiot.

   3 more examples

   When you put it that way, I guess I can see your point.

   To put it simply, we can't afford it.

   All this is ingeniously and ably put.

   1846, Julius Hare, The Mission of the Comforter

5. To set before one for judgment, acceptance, or rejection; to bring to the attention.

   to put a question; to put a case

   4 more examples

   I put it to you, Sir, that you are a thief and a liar.

   Put the perceptions and you put the mind.

   1708-1710, George Berkeley, Philosophical Commentaries or Common-Place Book

   Now if there was one thing that the animals were completely certain of, it was that they did not want Jones back. When it was put to them in this light, they had no more to say.

   1943 November – 1944 February (date written; published 1945 August 17), George Orwell [pseudonym; Eric Arthur Blair], Animal Farm […], London: Secker & Warburg, published May 1962, →OCLC

   The exact question being put to voters for a yes or no answer is: “Should Iceland reopen accession negotiations with the European Union?”

   2026 August 18, Tiago Ventura, “Iceland’s E.U. Referendum, Explained”, in TIME, archived from the original on 19 Aug 2026

6. To set as a calculation or estimate.

   They have put the cost of repairs at around £10 million.

7. To steer; to direct one's course; to go.

   to put to sea

   1 more example

   His fury thus appeased, he puts to land.

   1697, Virgil, “The Sixth Book of the Æneis”, in John Dryden, transl., The Works of Virgil: Containing His Pastorals, Georgics, and Æneis. […], London: […] Jacob Tonson, […], →OCLC

8. businessTo sell (assets) under the terms of a put option.

   He got out of his Procter and Gamble bet by putting his shares at 80.

9. especiallyathleticsTo throw with a pushing motion, especially in reference to the sport of shot put. (Do not confuse with putt.)

   He put the shot out beyond the 20-metre mark.

10. To play a card or a hand in the game called "put".
11. obsoleteTo lay down; to give up; to surrender.

    No man hath more love than this, that a man put his life for his friends.

    c. 1382–1395, John Wycliffe [et al.], edited by Josiah Forshall and Frederic Madden, The Holy Bible, […], volume IV, Oxford: At the University Press, published 1850, →OCLC, John 15:13, page 280

12. obsoleteTo incite; to entice; to urge; to constrain; to oblige.

    These wretches put us upon all mischief.

    1722, Jonathan Swift, The Last Speech of Ebenezer Elliston

    2 more examples

    Thank him who puts me loath to this revenge

    1667, John Milton, “Book IV”, in Paradise Lost. […], London: […] [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker […]; [a]nd by Robert Boulter […]; [a]nd Matthias Walker, […], →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books: […], London: Basil Montagu Pickering […], 1873, →OCLC, line 386

    Put me not to use the carnal weapon in my own defence.

    1822, [Walter Scott], Peveril of the Peak. […], volume (please specify |volume=I to IV), Edinburgh: […] Archibald Constable and Co.; London: Hurst, Robinson, and Co., →OCLC

13. businessTo convey coal in the mine, as for example from the working to the tramway.

plural puts · alternative obsolete putt

1. abbreviationcountableellipsisuncountablebusinessEllipsis of put option (“right to sell something at a predetermined price”)

   He bought a January '08 put for Procter and Gamble at 80 to hedge his bet.

   1 more example

   c. 1900, Universal Cyclopaedia Entry for Stock-Exchange A put and a call may be combined in one instrument, the holder of which may either buy or sell as he chooses at the fixed price.

2. countableuncountableThe act of putting; an action; a movement; a thrust; a push.

   the put of a ball

   1 more example

   The Stag's was a Forc'd put, and a Chance rather than a Choice.

   1692, Roger L’Estrange, “ (please specify the fable number.) (please specify the name of the fable.)”, in Fables, of Æsop and Other Eminent Mythologists: […], London: […] R[ichard] Sare, […], →OCLC

3. uncountableAn old card game.

   Among the in-door amusements of the costermonger is card-playing, at which many of them are adepts. The usual games are all-fours, all-fives, cribbage, and put.

   1851, Henry Mayhew, “Costermongers”, in London Labour and the London Poor

plural puts

1. obsoleteA fellow, especially an eccentric or elderly one; a duffer.

   Queer Country-puts extol Queen Bess's reign, And of lost hospitality complain.

   1733, James Bramston, The Man of Taste

   3 more examples

   The old put wanted to make a parson of me, but d—n me, thinks I to myself, I'll nick you there, old cull; the devil a smack of your nonsense shall you ever get into me.

   1749, Henry Fielding, Tom Jones, Folio Society, published 1973, page 244

   The Captain has a hearty contempt for his father, I can see, and calls him an old put, an old snob, an old chaw-bacon, and numberless other pretty names.

   1847 January – 1848 July, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 11, in Vanity Fair […], London: Bradbury and Evans […], published 1848, →OCLC

   Any number of varlet to be had for a few ducats and what droll puts the citizens seem in it all!

   1870, Frederic Harrison, “The Romance of the Peerage: Lothair,”, in Fortnightly Review

plural puts

1. obsoleteA prostitute.

   And Mrs. Penny-a-hoist Pim, said Mr. Gorman. That old put, said Mr. Nolan.

   1953, Samuel Beckett, Watt, [Paris]: Olympia Press, →OCLC

plural PUTs

1. abbreviationacronymcountableuncountabletestingcomputingAcronym of parameterized unit test.
2. abbreviationacronymcountableuncountabletestingcomputingAcronym of parameterized unit testing.
3. abbreviationcountableinitialismuncountablebusinessInitialism of programmable unijunction transistor.
4. abbreviationcountableinitialismuncountablebroadcastingInitialism of person using television.