generate

verb

OPAL WOPAL S

/ˈdʒenəreɪt/

Verb Forms

present simple I / you / we / they generate	/ˈdʒenəreɪt/ /ˈdʒenəreɪt/
he / she / it generates	/ˈdʒenəreɪts/ /ˈdʒenəreɪts/
past simple generated	/ˈdʒenəreɪtɪd/ /ˈdʒenəreɪtɪd/
past participle generated	/ˈdʒenəreɪtɪd/ /ˈdʒenəreɪtɪd/
-ing form generating	/ˈdʒenəreɪtɪŋ/ /ˈdʒenəreɪtɪŋ/

jump to other results

generate something to produce energy, especially electricity
- The wind turbines are used to generate electricity.
- to generate heat/power
- Living cells generate energy from food.
Wordfinder
- battery
- charge
- conduct
- connect
- electricity
- generate
- insulate
- power
- switch
- wire
generate something to produce or create something
- to generate revenue/income/profit
- We need someone to generate new ideas.
- The proposal has generated a lot of interest.
Synonyms make
make
- do
- create
- develop
- produce
- generate
- form
These words all mean to make something from parts or materials, or to cause something to exist or happen.
- make to create or prepare something by combining materials or putting parts together; to cause something to exist or happen:
  She makes her own clothes.
  She made a good impression on the interviewer.
- do (rather informal) to make or prepare something, especially something artistic or something to eat:
  He did a beautiful drawing of a house.
  Who’s doing the food for the party?
- create to make something exist or happen, especially something new that did not exist before:
  Scientists disagree about how the universe was created.
make or create?Make is a more general word and is more often used for physical things: you would usually make a table/dress/cake but create jobs/wealth. You can use create for something physical in order to emphasize how original or unusual the object is: Try this new dish, created by our head chef.
- develop (used especially in business contexts) to think of and produce a new product:
  to develop new software
- produce to make things to be sold; to create something using skill:
  a factory that produces microchips
- generate to produce or create something, especially power, money or ideas:
  to generate electricity
  Brainstorming is a good way of generating ideas.
- form [often passive] to make something from something else; to make something into something else:
  Rearrange the letters to form a new word.
  The chain is formed from 136 links.
Patterns
- to make/create/develop/produce/generate/form something from/out of something
- to make/form something into something
- to make/produce wine
- to create/develop a new product
- to create/produce/generate income/profits/wealth
- to produce/generate electricity/heat/power
Extra Examples
- The lottery is expected to generate substantial funds for charities.
- People used to believe that dirt spontaneously generated disease.
- a sequence of randomly generated fractions
Topics The environmentb2
Oxford Collocations Dictionary
adverb
- quickly
- automatically
- spontaneously
- …
verb + generate
- help (to)
- be used to
- be expected to
- …
preposition
- from
See full entry
generate something (computing) to produce a set or sequence of data by taking an initial set of data and applying a mathematical or logical process to it
- We generated 10 data sets, which we used to run each of the models.

Word Originearly 16th cent. (in the sense ‘beget, procreate’): from Latin generat- ‘created’, from the verb generare, from genus, gener- ‘stock, race’.