befriend
Americanverb (used with object)
verb
Other Word Forms
Etymology
Origin of befriend
Explanation
There are many ways to make someone your friend. You can offer assistance with a project, or provide comfort at a time of loss. Perhaps the easiest way to befriend someone, however, is just to smile and say "hi." The prefix "be-" is from Old English, and has several meanings. In befriend, the meaning is "cause to be," so to befriend someone is to cause him or her to be your friend. Mahatma Gandhi once said, “It is easy enough to be friendly to one's friends. But to befriend the one who regards himself as your enemy is the quintessence of true religion. The other is mere business.”
Vocabulary lists containing befriend
Harry Belafonte (1927–2023) Tribute List
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"Sordid" and "Blatant" Attacks: Ten Words in the News You Need to Know
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Good Masters! Sweet Ladies! Voices from a Medieval Village
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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.
In a similar leap, Jimmy and Alice forgive and befriend Goldstein’s Louis, the man who crashed his car into Tia’s and killed her.
From Salon • Feb. 7, 2026
They were, he recalled in “Making It,” “brave, proud, and unstintingly loyal once they had decided to befriend you.”
From The Wall Street Journal • Dec. 17, 2025
Mrs Payne told the jury that Miss Wandelt's contact - including trying to befriend her daughter on social media - left her "angry".
From BBC • Oct. 15, 2025
One method, Friend A recalls, was simple: Agnes would befriend someone who offered to buy her a drink, then quietly ask the bartender to skip the drink and hand her the cash instead.
From BBC • Sep. 20, 2025
She holds out her hand to befriend the dark bird.
From "How the García Girls Lost Their Accents" by Julia Alvarez
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.
