fabricate
Americanverb (used with object)
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fabricates,
present (3rd person singular)
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fabricated,
past participle, past
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fabricating
present participle
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to make by art or skill and labor; construct.
The finest craftspeople fabricated this clock.
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to make by assembling parts or sections.
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to devise or invent (a legend, lie, etc.).
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to fake; forge (a document, signature, etc.).
verb
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to make, build, or construct
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to devise, invent, or concoct (a story, lie, etc)
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to fake or forge
Synonym Usage
See manufacture.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
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fabricatesimple
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fabricatessimple
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have fabricatedperfect
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has fabricatedperfect
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am fabricatingprogressive
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are fabricatingprogressive
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is fabricatingprogressive
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have been fabricatingperfect progressive
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has been fabricatingperfect progressive
Past
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fabricatedsimple
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had fabricatedperfect
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was fabricatingprogressive
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were fabricatingprogressive
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had been fabricatingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of fabricate
First recorded in 1400–50; late Middle English, from Latin fabricātus “made,” past participle of fabricāre; see fabric, -ate 1
Explanation
Do you like to construct mini airplanes from kits? Work on an assembly line? Piece together Ikea furniture? Then you certainly know how to fabricate, or to put together, things. While fabricate might mean the physical act of construction, it can also mean constructing a falsehood. Watch out — those well versed in the art of fabrication might have an ulterior motive. In the movies, the bad cops sometimes fabricate evidence to make the good guy look guilty. When you tell the teacher the dog ate your homework, you’ve fabricated a pretty silly excuse. So if you’re going to fabricate the truth, get some better material!
Vocabulary lists containing fabricate
Advanced English Words
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Fake It 'Til You Make It: Synonyms for "False"
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100 SAT Words Beginning with "F"
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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:
"This nonequilibrium fabrication approach enables us to fabricate materials from alloy vapor to a solid, introducing a significant number of dislocations in CoAl," Zhang said.
From Science Daily ● Jul. 31, 2026
Golding’s central conceit—that consciousness may fabricate its own continuity in the face of annihilation—gives the novel its claustrophobic intensity.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 22, 2026
And why MedPac — an independent body overseen by leading healthcare professionals from across all parts of the industry, from doctors to nursing organizations to health insurers themselves — would fabricate these numbers is unexplained.
From MarketWatch ● May 28, 2026
Andrew Glazer, director of the documentary on the 2018 disappearances, told AFP that Ramos is accused of paying actors to fabricate allegations against the military.
From Barron's ● May 14, 2026
Little by little he remembered fewer and fewer of the details, until finally he had to imagine them, even fabricate them, guess what they must have been.
From "Song of Solomon" by Toni Morrison
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., or TSMC, fabricates roughly 90% of the world’s most advanced semiconductor chips.
From The Wall Street Journal ● May 13, 2026
Exiled by Astoria to the garage, Hampton fabricates his special drill as the family watches from afar.
From Los Angeles Times ● Apr. 16, 2025
To print a new material from scratch, one must typically set up to 100 parameters in software that controls how the printer will extrude the material as it fabricates an object.
From Science Daily ● Apr. 8, 2024
But it absolutely drowns out what is important about the art and fabricates it into a spectacle — the very thing Doja Cat is afraid of becoming.
From Salon ● Sep. 25, 2023
The nineteenth century must produce its own literature, as it raises its own corn, and fabricates its own garments.
From The Parables of Our Lord by William Arnot
Generative A.I. certainly has the potential to worsen pandemic conspiracy theories by equipping them with highly convincing fabricated evidence.
From Slate ● Aug. 26, 2026
“To Share a Stomach” at the Brick features works envisioned by 25 Iranian artists that were fabricated with varying degrees of collaboration by 24 counterparts in the U.S.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 25, 2026
The fabricated content appeared on X in posts impersonating legitimate French media outlets and falsely claimed that Attal had Parkinson's disease and that Philippe had contracted an illness.
From Barron's ● Aug. 18, 2026
A7 hasn’t commented on the hack, although a Shor-backed political group hit by the hack has said the leaked documents included fabricated conversations.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 8, 2026
A pang of guilt hits me since I’ve fabricated said mission.
From "Mockingjay" by Suzanne Collins
These include cases in which the men were exonerated through DNA or blood evidence and others in which police are accused of fabricating evidence.
From Salon ● Aug. 10, 2026
He became embarrassed after he was caught fabricating or embellishing stories about playing college baseball, responding to protest scenes and an award he won in the police academy, according to the motion.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 7, 2026
Santos, who was elected as a Republican from a New York district, is known for fabricating his life story to win public office and was expelled from the House in 2023.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jun. 3, 2026
Producing high-quality crystalline silicon and fabricating high-performance semiconductor devices typically requires temperatures approaching 1,000 degrees Celsius.
From Science Daily ● May 30, 2026
Madame Manec brings her omelets, cassoulet, brochettes of fish, fabricating miracles out of ration tickets and the dregs of her cupboards, but Marie-Laure refuses to eat.
From "All the Light We Cannot See" by Anthony Doerr
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.
