reduce
verb/rɪˈdjuːs/
/rɪˈduːs/
Verb Forms
Idioms Phrasal Verbs| present simple I / you / we / they reduce | /rɪˈdjuːs/ /rɪˈduːs/ |
| he / she / it reduces | /rɪˈdjuːsɪz/ /rɪˈduːsɪz/ |
| past simple reduced | /rɪˈdjuːst/ /rɪˈduːst/ |
| past participle reduced | /rɪˈdjuːst/ /rɪˈduːst/ |
| -ing form reducing | /rɪˈdjuːsɪŋ/ /rɪˈduːsɪŋ/ |
- [transitive, intransitive] to make something less or smaller in size, quantity, price, etc.; to become less or smaller in size, quantity, etc.
- reduce something Reduce speed now (= on a sign).
- Giving up smoking reduces the risk of heart disease.
- to reduce costs/numbers
- a reduced rate/price
- They will require car makers to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide by 30%.
- reduce something by something Costs have been reduced by 20% over the past year.
- reduce something from something to something The number of employees was reduced from 40 to 25.
- reduce something to something The skirt was reduced to £10 in the sale.
- reduce in something Towards the coast, the hills gradually reduce in size.
- The number of search engines has reduced substantially over the last few years.
Extra ExamplesTopics Change, cause and effecta2, Shoppinga2, Moneya2- Legislation progressively reduced the number of situations in which industrial action could be taken.
- Pollution from the works has been reduced by 70 per cent.
- The price is reduced from 99 cents to 85 cents.
- The risks must be reduced to the absolute minimum.
- We need to reduce the speed slightly.
- The program aims to reduce or eliminate pesticides.
- This could greatly reduce the number of injuries suffered.
- She is trying to reduce the amount of time she spends away from home.
- Regulating traffic will reduce the accident rate significantly.
- Many studios sell ten cards for a reduced rate.
- Yoga can help reduce stress levels.
- It was a tough decision to reduce the size of the workforce.
- The police will be given more resources to reduce violent crime.
Oxford Collocations Dictionaryadverb- considerably
- dramatically
- drastically
- …
- aim to
- attempt to
- seek to
- …
- by
- in
- from
- …
- an attempt to reduce something
- an effort to reduce something
- measures to reduce something
- …
- [transitive, intransitive] reduce (something) if you reduce a liquid or a liquid reduces, you boil it so that it becomes less in quantity
- [intransitive] (North American English, informal) to lose weight by limiting the amount and type of food that you eat
- a reducing plan
- [transitive] reduce something (chemistry) to add one or more electrons to a substance or to remove oxygen from a substance compare oxidize
Word Originlate Middle English: from Latin reducere, from re- ‘back, again’ + ducere ‘bring, lead’. The original sense was ‘bring back’ ; this led to ‘bring to a different state’, then ‘bring to a simpler or lower state’ (hence sense (2)); and finally ‘diminish in size or amount’ (sense (1), dating from the late 18th cent.).
Idioms
See reduce in the Oxford Advanced American DictionarySee reduce in the Oxford Learner's Dictionary of Academic Englishreduced circumstances
- the state of being poorer than you were before. People say ‘living in reduced circumstances’ to avoid saying ‘poor’.
Check pronunciation:
reduce