spend

present singular third person spends · participle present spending · participle past spent · past spent

1. ambitransitiveTo pay out (money).

   I've already spent hundreds of dollars buying dog chow.

   3 more examples

   He spends far more on gambling than he does on living proper.

   Then there came a reg'lar terror of a sou'wester same as you don't get one summer in a thousand, and blowed the shanty flat and ripped about half of the weir poles out of the sand. We spent consider'ble money getting 'em reset, and then a swordfish got into the pound and tore the nets all to slathers, right in the middle of the squiteague season.

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

   In America alone, people spent $170 billion on “direct marketing”—junk mail of both the physical and electronic varieties—last year. Yet of those who received unsolicited adverts through the post, only 3% bought anything as a result.

   2013 May 25, “No hiding place”, in The Economist, volume 407, number 8837, page 74

   Synonyms: outlay

2. To bestow; to employ; often with on or upon.

   I […] am never loath / To spend my judgment.

   [1633], George Herbert, edited by [Nicholas Ferrar], The Temple. Sacred Poems, and Private Ejaculations, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire: […] Thomas Buck and Roger Daniel; and are to be sold by Francis Green, […], →OCLC

3. datedTo squander.

   to spend an estate in gambling

4. To exhaust, to wear out.

   The violence of the waves was spent.

   1 more example

   their bodies spent with long labour and thirst

   1603, Richard Knolles, The Generall Historie of the Turkes, […], London: […] Adam Islip, →OCLC

5. To consume, to use up (time).

   We spent the winter in the south of France.

   4 more examples

   My sister usually spends her free time in nightclubs.

   During the whole time of his abode in the university he generally spent thirteen hours of the day in study; by which assiduity besides an exact dispatch of the whole course of philosophy, he read over in a manner all classic authors that are extant[…]

   1661, John Fell, The Life of the most learned, reverend and pious Dr. H. Hammond

   The last occasion on which the Kaiser [Wilhelm II] used this train was for an inglorious journey into Holland towards the end of the 1914 war. He spent the night in it at Eysden [Eijsden], while the Queen of the Netherlands and a hastily summoned Cabinet debated what to do with him.

   1945 September and October, C. Hamilton Ellis, “Royal Trains—V”, in Railway Magazine, page 251

   Energy has seldom been found where we need it when we want it. Ancient nomads, wishing to ward off the evening chill and enjoy a meal around a campfire, had to collect wood and then spend time and effort coaxing the heat of friction out from between sticks to kindle a flame.

   2013 July-August, Henry Petroski, “Geothermal Energy”, in American Scientist, volume 101, number 4

6. ambitransitivedatedTo have an orgasm; to ejaculate sexually.

   The fish spends his semen on eggs which he finds floating and whose mother he has never seen.

7. intransitiveTo waste or wear away; to be consumed.

   Energy spends in the using of it.

   1 more example

   The sound spendeth and is dissipated in the open air.

   1627 (indicated as 1626), Francis [Bacon], “(please specify the page, or |century=I to X)”, in Sylua Syluarum: Or A Naturall Historie. In Ten Centuries. […], London: […] William Rawley […]; [p]rinted by J[ohn] H[aviland] for William Lee […], →OCLC

8. To be diffused; to spread.

   The vines that they use for wine are so often cut, that their sap spendeth into the grapes.

   1627 (indicated as 1626), Francis [Bacon], “(please specify the page, or |century=I to X)”, in Sylua Syluarum: Or A Naturall Historie. In Ten Centuries. […], London: […] William Rawley […]; [p]rinted by J[ohn] H[aviland] for William Lee […], →OCLC

9. businessTo break ground; to continue working.

plural spends

1. countableuncountableAmount of money spent (during a period); expenditure.

   I’m sorry, boss, but the advertising spend exceeded the budget again this month.

2. countablein pluraluncountableExpenditures; money or pocket money.

   Total January spends by year

   2011 February 1, Ami Sedghi, “Record breaking January transfers: find the spends by club”, in The Guardian

   1 more example

   The spends have been made by our strategic partners […]

   2011, “Council spending over £500”, in Rochdale Metropolitan Borough Council, archived from the original on 09 Apr 2012

3. countableuncountableDischarged semen.
4. countableuncountableVaginal discharge.