expend

verb ex·pend \ ik-ˈspend \

Definition of expend

transitive verb

1 :to pay out :spend

the social services upon which public revenue is expended
—J. A. Hobson

2 :to make use of for a specific purpose :utilize

projects on which they expended great energy

; also :use up

—

expender

noun

See expend defined for English-language learners

See expend defined for kids

Examples of expend in a Sentence

Are we willing to expend the time and resources required to solve the problem?
redecoration will have to wait, since we've just expended our last dollar in buying the house

Recent Examples of expend from the Web

And Jaffe is right, players have been finding ways to cheat since the game was invented, and baseball analysis has expended a lot of effort to put different eras in context.

— zach buchanan, Cincinnati.com, "BAR: A good sign for Zack Cozart," 8 Aug. 2017
Although some would argue that ice cream would be fine on its own, who wants to expend the energy to lift a spoon on a 100-degree day?

— carla meyer, sacbee, "These two tasty, frosty shakes – one kid-friendly, one not – help beat the Sacramento heat," 2 Aug. 2017
Usually when this happens, the story becomes a dramatic puzzle, whose solution involves the protagonists expending tons of creative energy in an effort to either destroy their mutinous creation or contain it.

— tim bajarin, Fortune, "Why We Need the Liberal Arts in Technology’s Age of Distraction," 25 July 2017
Trump appeared on the show far more than his GOP rivals, and he was allowed to call in — thus providing Trump with a nationwide audience without the inconvenience of leaving the campaign trail or expending resources.

— sarah quinlan, National Review, "Joe Scarborough, Fake Anti-Trumper," 20 July 2017
Republicans on Capitol Hill are wary of expending more political capital to defend a beleaguered president who has thrown them under the bus time and again.

— zeke j miller, Time, "How Bad Will the Russian Scandal Get?," 12 July 2017
Its recent explosion in the United States has made the ever-expending genre a mainstay of the country's entertainment industry.

— kat bein, Billboard, "First-Ever Electronic Music Awards Are Coming to L.A. in September," 12 July 2017
The Navy might someday be involved in major fleet actions in which large numbers of missiles are expended.

— kyle mizokami, Popular Mechanics, "The Navy Needs a Way to Reload Missile Silos at Sea," 6 July 2017
In the past three years, Air Force officials said there has been a tenfold increase in weapons expended on the battlefield.

— greg jaffe, Washington Post, "The watchers: Airmen who surveil the Islamic State never get to look away," 6 July 2017

These example sentences are selected automatically from various online news sources to reflect current usage of the word 'expend.' Views expressed in the examples do not represent the opinion of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback.