collaborate
Americanverb (used without object)
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collaborates,
present (3rd person singular)
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collaborated,
past participle, past
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collaborating
present participle
verb
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to work with another or others on a joint project
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to cooperate as a traitor, esp with an enemy occupying one's own country
Usage
What does collaborate mean? Collaborate means to work together, especially on a goal or shared project. Collaborate is often used in a positive context to refer to two or more parties successfully working together on professional or artistic projects. It often implies more than just cooperation. When two or more people collaborate, they often share and develop each other’s ideas. The act of collaborating is called collaboration. Such a joint effort can be described with the adjective collaborative. People who collaborate are called collaborators. Collaborate can also be used in a much more specific way meaning to cooperate as a traitor with enemy forces in one’s own country. This is much less commonly used than its general sense. Example: The two musicians, who usually have very different styles, collaborated on the groundbreaking new album.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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collaboratesimple
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collaboratessimple
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have collaboratedperfect
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has collaboratedperfect
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am collaboratingprogressive
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are collaboratingprogressive
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is collaboratingprogressive
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have been collaboratingperfect progressive
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has been collaboratingperfect progressive
Past
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collaboratedsimple
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had collaboratedperfect
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was collaboratingprogressive
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were collaboratingprogressive
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had been collaboratingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of collaborate
First recorded in 1870–75; from Late Latin collabōrātus (past participle of collabōrāre), equivalent to col- col- 1 + labor “work” + -ātus -ate 1
Compare meaning
How does collaborate compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:
Explanation
When you work together on shared goal, you collaborate. If you don't just split a project up evenly but work together on creating solutions, you collaborate. Inside the word you see co-labor, or "working together." Cooperation is simply splitting up the work and getting it done. Collaboration is when you brainstorm, create, and share possible solutions. During World War II, however, Nazi collaborators were sharing ideas with the wrong side. In today's pop music scene, collaboration means featuring a guest star on a record, and it's often a surefire way to boost sales.
Vocabulary lists containing collaborate
100 Top "SAT" Words
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The Diary of Anne Frank
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Essential English Vocabulary, List 1
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
The key is how well UWM and Oaktree are willing to collaborate, said Jennifer McGuinness-Lubbert, CEO of mortgage asset-management firm Pivot Financial.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 11, 2026
During the pandemic, he would go on to collaborate with Cora on a short film called The Singer.
From BBC ● Aug. 11, 2026
He loved to collaborate but didn’t like the experience of recording.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 30, 2026
The siblings collaborate on walk-around suits and puppets large and small.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 29, 2026
In lots of science fields, the researchers get to know one another’s work and often collaborate.
From "A Deadly Wandering: A Mystery, a Landmark Investigation, and the Astonishing Science of Attention in the Digital Age" by Matt Richtel
Project Glasswing collaborates with cybersecurity firms like CrowdStrike and Palo Alto Networks to adapt Mythos for defense.
From Barron's ● Apr. 10, 2026
It is also a founding member of the VPN Trust Initiative and collaborates with cybersecurity expert Troy Hunt to refine breach response protocols and educate users on data safety.
From Salon ● Mar. 27, 2026
The label said it believes "both versions of the track infringe on Jorja's rights and unfairly take advantage of the work of all the songwriters with whom she collaborates".
From BBC ● Dec. 1, 2025
The study was funded by a research grant from Mars, Inc., which collaborates with researchers to study potential benefits of cocoa flavanols for human health.
From Science Daily ● Oct. 27, 2025
Whether it be his own play, or that of some outsider, with whom, in the final product, Belasco always collaborates, the manuscripts, constituting his producing library, are evidence of his instinctive eye for stage effect.
From The Return of Peter Grimm by Montrose Jonas Moses
Sipe of the University of Toronto, who collaborated with the researchers on an earlier project, had predicted that such an "electron lighthouse" could be created.
From Science Daily ● Jul. 28, 2026
In 2025, it claimed, the defendants hacked into the mobile device of a producer who had collaborated with Grande and accessed unreleased masters, demos and footage from recording sessions.
From BBC ● Jul. 28, 2026
Gojira frontman Joe Duplantier collaborated with the McCreary brothers and the Mystery of the Bulgarian Voices choir on “Black Box” to create a work of dissonant majesty.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 28, 2026
The couple also collaborated on another business, Valley View Rodeo, which was founded in 2023 and states on its website that it was built to keep “the Western lifestyle alive in the modern day.”
From MarketWatch ● Jul. 21, 2026
She and engineer A1 Hamer collaborated on four reports between 1963 and 1969, some of them written to work out the all-important lunar orbits, others asking the question, What if?
From "Hidden Figures" by Margot Lee Shetterly
Brands have long been associated with this approach, with many collaborating with athletes and stars from other sports.
From BBC ● Aug. 14, 2026
Bloomberg says GameStop could propose collaborating with eBay in some way other than a merger.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 10, 2026
The team is collaborating with Discovery to Impact, UT's commercialization unit, in an effort to move the technology toward the market.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 7, 2026
Van der Velden says the company is also collaborating with Hollywood directors and producers who have asked not to be identified publicly, fearing backlash.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 13, 2026
She began her sound effects career collaborating with her husband, Arthur Nichols, who invented the first sound machines for radio.
From "Spooked!" by Gail Jarrow
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
