enrich
Americanverb (used with object)
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enriches,
present (3rd person singular)
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enriched,
past participle, past
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enriching
present participle
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to supply with riches, wealth, abundant or valuable possessions, etc..
Commerce enriches a nation.
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to supply with abundance of anything desirable.
to enrich the mind with knowledge.
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to add greater value or significance to.
Art enriches life.
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to adorn or decorate.
a picture frame enriched with gold.
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to make finer in quality, as by supplying desirable elements or ingredients.
to enrich soil.
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Physics. to increase the proportion of a valuable mineral or isotope in (a substance or material).
The fuel was enriched with uranium 235 for the nuclear reactor.
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Nutrition.
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to restore to (a food) a nutrient that has been lost during an early stage of processing.
to enrich flour with thiamine, iron, niacin, and riboflavin.
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to add vitamins and minerals to (food) to enhance its nutritive value.
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verb
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to increase the wealth of
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to endow with fine or desirable qualities
to enrich one's experience by travelling
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to make more beautiful; adorn; decorate
a robe enriched with jewels
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to improve in quality, colour, flavour, etc
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to increase the food value of by adding nutrients
to enrich dog biscuits with calcium
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to make (soil) more productive, esp by adding fertilizer
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physics to increase the concentration or abundance of one component or isotope in (a solution or mixture); concentrate
to enrich a solution by evaporation
enrich a nuclear fuel
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
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enrichernoun
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enrichmentnoun
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enrichedadjective
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self-enrichingadjective
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unenrichingadjective
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enrichinglyadverb
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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enrichsimple
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enrichessimple
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have enrichedperfect
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has enrichedperfect
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am enrichingprogressive
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are enrichingprogressive
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is enrichingprogressive
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have been enrichingperfect progressive
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has been enrichingperfect progressive
Past
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enrichedsimple
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had enrichedperfect
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was enrichingprogressive
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were enrichingprogressive
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had been enrichingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of enrich
First recorded in 1350–1400; Middle English enrichen, from Old French enrichir; equivalent to en- 1 + rich
Explanation
To enrich something is to make it richer, or to improve the quality of it. You play the lottery because it might enrich your bank account; you play ping-pong to enrich your quality of life. Regardless of the sense it is used in, the key to enrich is the word rich (you can almost think of it as the verb form of the adjective). So to enrich something is to make it rich, richer, or just plain better. Enrich always needs an object: You can’t visit a wax museum just to enrich, but you can go to enrich your life. Verbs that enrich include improve, enhance, cultivate, better, and develop.
Vocabulary lists containing enrich
Lyndon B. Johnson on "The Great Society" (1964)
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List 1
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Obama's State of the Union Address, 2014
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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:
Yousef Pezeshkian, the president’s son and adviser, asserted in August, “Our survival does not depend on enrichment. We won’t die if we don’t enrich uranium.”
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 15, 2026
American companies and their foreign suppliers would construct a facility that would enrich uranium to a level of 5%.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 2, 2026
The pines would also enrich landowners and the Bordeaux bourgeoisie: The hardscrabble culture of sheep grazing gave way to a booming industry of wood, paper and resin.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 30, 2026
However, Uefa has accused Fifa of using football "to enrich themselves and their friends", while Concacaf and AFC have both expressed concerns about consultation over the plans.
From BBC ● Jul. 31, 2026
In keeping with the therapeutic mores of the age, he decided to do his convalescing in Europe, where the scenery also would provide an opportunity for him to enrich his visual vocabulary.
From "The Devil in the White City" by Erik Larson
The researchers also created a genome-wide hybridization panel that enriches the remaining sample for methylated DNA from solid organs, including organs that may be affected by disease.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 11, 2026
"This kind of activity enriches them a great deal, not only visually for the audience but for them as well," he said.
From Barron's ● Jun. 6, 2026
"You know, the main thing is just that music enriches your existence," he muses.
From BBC ● Mar. 25, 2026
Mr. Venables’s music, built on baroque and folk styles and instruments, enriches and illuminates the text.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Dec. 5, 2025
New ways of stringing words and sentences together come into fashion and vanish again, but the underlying structure simply grows, enriches itself, expands.
From "The Lives of a Cell" by Lewis Thomas
Many said they want to give their pets a fully enriched life, fearing that indoor-only cats miss out on the outdoors experience.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 8, 2026
"It's enriched and nourished my life and my sense of my national identity so much to find out more and more about this," he said.
From BBC ● Sep. 3, 2026
Heavily processed milling strips away bran, germ and other nutrients, and while federal law requires such flour to be enriched, the end product still lacks key vitamins, minerals and anti-oxidants.
From Barron's ● Sep. 3, 2026
As gravity pulls those enriched clouds together, they can form rotating disks around young stars, similar to the disk of material that eventually produced our own Solar System.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 31, 2026
Time had encircled her softly, enriched and deepened her beauty as the years tiptoed past her.
From "The Great Santini" by Pat Conroy
The money from selling the antiquities is yet another input enriching the RSF’s financial empire, which experts count as one of the world’s largest non-state economies.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 8, 2026
According to the deal, U.S. and Saudi officials will carry out a “Joint Enrichment and Conversion Study” within two years to study “the economic viability” of enriching uranium and arrangements to guard against proliferation risks.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 2, 2026
Those explosions scattered newly created heavy elements throughout the cluster, enriching the gas that later gave birth to another generation of stars.
From Science Daily ● Jul. 5, 2026
External link At other times, he said, other countries can enrich, so why can we keep them from enriching?
From Barron's ● Jun. 25, 2026
The rivers flood in the rainy season, enriching the land, Nile Delta style.
From "1491" by Charles C. Mann
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.
