Strengthen

//ˈstɹɛŋ(k)θən// verb

verb ·Common ·High school level

Definitions

Verb
  1. 1
    To make strong or stronger; to add strength to; to increase the strength of; to fortify. transitive

    "strengthen a muscle"

  2. 2
    give a healthy elasticity to wordnet
  3. 3
    To empower; to give moral strength to; to encourage; to enhearten. transitive

    "Charge Joshua, and encourage him, and strengthen him."

  4. 4
    gain strength wordnet
  5. 5
    To augment; to improve; to intensify. transitive
Show 4 more definitions
  1. 6
    make strong or stronger wordnet
  2. 7
    To reinforce, to add to, to support (someone or something) transitive

    "strengthen an army"

  3. 8
    To substantiate; to corroborate (a belief, argument, etc.) transitive

    "strengthen the cause"

  4. 9
    To grow strong or stronger. intransitive

    "my affection seems so superfluous that I often wonder why it should be so strong. But wise or foolish, there it is, strengthening with the years whether I will or no"

Synonyms

All synonyms
fortifyfortifyaccelerateaccrueaccumulateadd to

Example

More examples

"It is important to strengthen the basis."

Etymology

From rare Middle English strengthenen (14th c.), from earlier strengthen (12th c.), where -en is the infinitive ending. Probably the original form was reinterpreted as strength + -en around the time when the infinitive ending was being apocopated in late Middle English.

Related phrases

strengthen upstrengthening plaster

More for "strengthen"

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.