English Verb Phrases

Question 1

Take off

Answer 1

(remove)
He takes off his shoes
(leave / depart)
He took off (from the house)
We are about to take off / the airplane has taken off

Question 2

Take up

Answer 2

(take/use/occupar)
She took up all the room in the backseat of the car *with her luggage

(start doing something)
She decided to take up singing as a new hobby

Question 3

Take after

Answer 3

(be similar to a parent)
he takes after his father with the sense of humor

he will take that class after the other one.
he will take it after.

Question 4

Take in

Answer 4

(absorb experience)
At the top of the mountain, he took in the scenery
“I’m just taking it all in”
He took in the moment (when they won/lost the game)
(absorb information)
It was difficult to take in all the information from the lecture.

Question 5

Get up

Answer 5

Get up from bed/couch/lying down
I have to get up early tomorrow for work
GET UP!

Question 6

Get by

Answer 6

survive / deal with something
“even with a small salary, they manage to get by”

move past someone or something
“I need to get by you”

Question 7

Get along

Answer 7

have a good relationship with
“They get along well with their new neighbors.”
llevarse bien

Question 8

Make up

Answer 8

Invent or lie
“He had to make up a story to explain why he was late.”

to improvise, not have a plan (more rare)
“I make/made it up as I went”

Question 9

Make off

Answer 9

Steal or Take - implies motion
“the theif made off with the money before anyone noticed”

Question 10

Come up

Answer 10

To imagine/invent
“He came up with a new idea”

To be mentioned or arise
“Your name will come up during the meeting”
“Your name came up during the meeting”

**to happen in the near future **
“the next topic is coming up soon”

Question 11

Come across

Answer 11

Find / Find without looking
“He came across an old newspaper article mentioning his grandfather”

Question 12

Go out

Answer 12

To leave
They went out to dinner
To be dating someone (highschool)
He is going out with her

Question 13

Go over

Answer 13

Review or Examine
They went over the paperwork

To not understand
The joke went over his head

Question 14

Go off

Answer 14

Initiate / Explode
the bomb went off in the building
the alarm went off earlying in the morning

Start yelling at someone (casual)
he went off on her after she made a mistake

Question 15

Go on

Answer 15

Continue or Happen
please go on… (tell me more)
What is going on (happening) here?

Question 16

Turn out

Answer 16

To Attend
Thousands of people turned out (attended) for the concert.
The event had a good turn out. (a lot of people attended)

Result
Having to move turned out to be a good thing.

Question 17

Break down

Answer 17

Stop Functioning
the car always breaks down when I drive to work

Start Crying
She broke down in tears during the speech

Question 18

Break up

Answer 18

Come apart / Break into pieces
They broke up the gang
The cookie broke up in the bag

End a Relationship
they decided to break up after five years

Question 19

Set up

Answer 19

Establish or Arrange
“they set up a new business”
“can you set up the new computer”
“can you set up the meeting”

Question 20

Set in

Answer 20

Begin or Become Established
“once the cold weather set in, it was hard to go outside”

Question 21

Look after

Answer 21

Take Care Of
“can you look after my dog while I’m away”

Question 22

Look into

Answer 22

Investigate or Research
“we need to look into the problem to find a solution”

Question 23

Look forward to

Answer 23

Anticipate something happening
“I’m looking forward to my time off from work”
“I look forward to my time off from work”

Question 24

Look up

Answer 24

Search for information
“I’ll look up his phone number”

Question 25

Run across

Answer 25

Discover by chance
“I ran across an interesting article while browsing the internet”

Question 26

Run into

Answer 26

Collide
“the car ran into the pole”

“Meet Unexpectedly”
“we ran into each other at the cafe”

Question 27

Run out

Answer 27

Use up
“we have run out of tortas”

Question 28

Set back

Answer 28

Delay or Disrupt
“the project was set back by several weeks due to weather”
“the project suffered a set back”

Question 29

Set off

Answer 29

Cause something to happen
“the smoke set off the alarm”
“the thief set off the alarm”
Start a journey/adventure
“he set off on his trip to Asia”

Question 30

Break out

Answer 30

Escape
The prisoners tried to break out of jail

Start Suddenly
a fire broke out in the building
a riot broke out in the streets

Question 31

Break into

Answer 31

Break and then enter with force
He broke into the bank vault
They broke into the house

Question 32

Turn off

Answer 32

Disable / Remove Power
He turned off the TV

To Make Someone Not Like Something Anymore
His attitude at work really turned us off

the opposute, “turn on” is always sexual*

To Make Someone Not Be Attracted Anymore
It was a turn off when he started being aggressive

Question 33

Turn down

Answer 33

Lower
Please turn down the music
Reject or Say No To Something
He turned down the job offer

Question 34

Turn up

Answer 34

Increase
Can you turn up the volume?
Appear
She turned up (arrived) late to the party

Question 35

Come down

Answer 35

Decrease or Fall
The price of gas has come down
Get sick with (rare)
He came down with COVID

Question 36

Come around

Answer 36

Change your mind (slowly)
“he came around to selling the car”

Question 37

Make do

Answer 37

Manage with limited resources
like “get by with”
“We’ll have to make do with the supplies we have.”
“We’ll have to get by with with the supplies we have.”

Question 38

Make out

Answer 38

See or hear clearly
“I could barely make out the name on the sign in the photo”

to kiss strongly
“they were making out on the couch”

Question 39

Get over

Answer 39

recover from
It took her a week to get over the flu.