assembly line

American  

noun

• assembly lines
  plural

1. an arrangement of machines, tools, and workers in which a product is assembled by having each perform a specific, successive operation on an incomplete unit as it passes by in a series of stages organized in a direct line.

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assembly line British  

noun

1. a sequence of machines, tools, operations, workers, etc, in a factory, arranged so that at each stage a further process is carried out

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assembly line Cultural  

1. A line of factory workers and equipment along which a product being assembled passes consecutively from operation to operation until completed.

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Assembly lines are found in many industries but are particularly associated with automobile manufacturing.

Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• assembly lines
  plural

Etymology

Origin of assembly line

An Americanism dating back to 1910–15

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

assembly line

Parton could have limited her tracks to farmers, coal miners, swing shifters, assembly line workers and other laborers whom country music constantly lionizes, and no one would have complained.

From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 26, 2026

At the end of the assembly line, more humans emerge.

From BBC ● Aug. 24, 2026

"You can imagine a biosynthetic pathway almost as an assembly line," said Miller, who earned his Ph.D. in the Hamberger Lab.

From Science Daily ● Aug. 3, 2026

Ford, which helped pioneer the modern assembly line and still assembles most of its cars in the U.S., sees the shift as a business necessity—for itself and for dealers.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 1, 2026

As if we’ve worked twenty years together on an assembly line, Epsilon-5 and I snip samples, preparing dishes without needing to tell each other what we are doing or what to do next.

From "The Last Cuentista" by Donna Barba Higuera

Related Words

• production line