industrialize
Americanverb (used with object)
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to introduce industry into (an area) on a large scale.
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to convert to the ideals, methods, aims, etc., of industrialism.
verb (used without object)
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to undergo industrialization.
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to follow or espouse industrialism.
verb
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(tr) to develop industry on an extensive scale in (a country, region, etc)
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(intr) (of a country, region, etc) to undergo the development of industry on an extensive scale
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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industrializationnoun
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overindustrializeverb
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nonindustrializedadjective
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semi-industrializedadjective
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unindustrializedadjective
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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industrializesimple
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industrializessimple
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have industrializedperfect
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has industrializedperfect
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am industrializingprogressive
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are industrializingprogressive
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is industrializingprogressive
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have been industrializingperfect progressive
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has been industrializingperfect progressive
Past
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industrializedsimple
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had industrializedperfect
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was industrializingprogressive
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were industrializingprogressive
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had been industrializingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of industrialize
First recorded in 1880–85; industrial + -ize
Explanation
To introduce factories or other kinds of manufacturing to a society is to industrialize it. When a country industrializes, it typically becomes richer but also more polluted. Industrialized regions are those places where industry plays a major role in the life and economy of the people living there, and to industrialize is to develop this kind of economy. Usually, this means adding automated ways of making things, such as factories and mills. Building a new manufacturing plant in a rural town could be said to industrialize it, for example.
Vocabulary lists containing industrialize
East Asia - Middle School
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East Asia - High School
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Content Summary 5.3: The First Industrial Revolution
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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:
Now, Beijing is trying to industrialize something stranger: humanoid robots that can assemble parts, inspect products, move boxes and eventually take on some of the repetitive work still done by humans.
From MarketWatch ● May 27, 2026
Countries that industrialized, prospered; those that failed to industrialize, floundered.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 23, 2026
He expects to be able to commercialize them within one to two years and industrialize the process in another two to three years.
From Barron's ● Dec. 16, 2025
In South Korea, the country’s sprawling family-run conglomerates turbocharged the "Miracle on the Han River" by marshaling capital, technology and labor to industrialize the country at breakneck speed.
From Salon ● Dec. 31, 2024
In addition to the collectivization of farms, the Five-Year Plans also aimed to industrialize the USSR.
From "A Thousand Sisters" by Elizabeth Wein
But, as D’Souza rather proudly observes, the adjudication process is stripped of the inconvenience of courts: “The Gawker litigation took ten years and millions of dollars. Objection industrializes this process.”
From Salon ● Apr. 23, 2026
“This trend is likely to continue as the Global South industrializes further and consumers have greater disposable income to spend on comfort.”
From Seattle Times ● Sep. 11, 2023
“President Magufuli is very committed to ensure that the country industrializes, but you cannot industrialize unless you have access to electricity,” Adesina told journalists on Saturday after his talks with the president.
From Reuters ● Apr. 28, 2018
“This is proof that when such a big country industrializes, its effect will spread everywhere.”
From New York Times ● Apr. 24, 2013
Even among older cities in industrialized nations, where it’s often hard to find the space to build, London stands out.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 20, 2026
Instead, reeling from oil and gas price aftershocks from Iran, the industrialized world is now running toward renewable energy.
From Salon ● May 16, 2026
Despite the USPS’s recent price increases, the cost of a first-class stamp in the U.S. remains “the lowest in the industrialized world,” he added.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 11, 2026
In contrast, some industrialized nations saw declines in light emissions, often linked to the adoption of LED technology and policies aimed at reducing light pollution.
From Science Daily ● Apr. 9, 2026
One general theory for the origin of aids goes at, during the late nineteen-sixties, a new and crative business grew up in Africa, the export of primates to industrialized countries for use in medical research.
From "The Hot Zone" by Richard Preston
Factories in the industrializing North churned out munitions in volumes the agrarian South couldn’t touch.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 29, 2026
"We're industrializing an easier way of forming sheet metal based on origami," says chief executive and co-founder, Jonas Nyvang.
From BBC ● Mar. 3, 2026
Like West Africa, El Salvador is a past source country for the production of rubber, essential to an industrializing Europe’s historic colonizing abroad.
From Los Angeles Times ● May 22, 2024
When historians search for parallels, they often point to the period before the Civil War, when an industrializing North and an agrarian South were divided over slavery.
From New York Times ● Jan. 25, 2024
This is a point to which, along with other general questions connected with the industrializing of China, I shall return in my last chapter.
From The Problem of China by Russell, Bertrand
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.
