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materialize

[muh-teer-ee-uh-lahyz]
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verb (used without object), ma·te·ri·al·ized, ma·te·ri·al·iz·ing.
  1. to come into perceptible existence; appear; become actual or real; be realized or carried out: Our plans never materialized.
  2. to assume material or bodily form; become corporeal: The ghost materialized before Hamlet.
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verb (used with object), ma·te·ri·al·ized, ma·te·ri·al·iz·ing.
  1. to give material form to; realize: to materialize an ambition.
  2. to invest with material attributes: to materialize abstract ideas with metaphors.
  3. to make physically perceptible; cause (a spirit or the like) to appear in bodily form.
  4. to render materialistic.
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Also especially British, ma·te·ri·al·ise.

Origin of materialize

First recorded in 1700–10; material + -ize
Related formsma·te·ri·al·i·za·tion, nounma·te·ri·al·iz·er, nounre·ma·te·ri·al·i·za·tion, nounre·ma·te·ri·al·ize, verb, re·ma·te·ri·al·ized, re·ma·te·ri·al·iz·ing.un·ma·te·ri·al·ized, adjective

Synonyms

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1. emerge, show, rise, issue.
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018

Examples from the Web for materialize

Contemporary Examples

Historical Examples

  • Is that the room where he's expected to materialize with his machine?

    Martians Never Die

    Lucius Daniel

  • He made his camp and bided the arrival of the cattle; but that arrival did not materialize.

    When the West Was Young

    Frederick R. Bechdolt

  • For some reason, however, the collaborated volume did not materialize.

  • But, somehow, these literary evenings never did materialize.

    Gigolo

    Edna Ferber

  • A ghost could not materialize and kidnap a girl of flesh and blood.

    The White Invaders

    Raymond King Cummings

British Dictionary definitions for materialize

materialize

materialise

verb
  1. (intr) to become fact; actually happenour hopes never materialized
  2. to invest or become invested with a physical shape or form
  3. to cause (a spirit, as of a dead person) to appear in material form or (of a spirit) to appear in such form
  4. (intr) to take shape; become tangibleafter hours of discussion, the project finally began to materialize
  5. physics to form (material particles) from energy, as in pair production
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Derived Formsmaterialization or materialisation, nounmaterializer or materialiser, noun
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Word Origin and History for materialize

v.

1710, "represent as material," from material (adj.) + -ize. Meaning "appear in bodily form" is 1880, in spiritualism. Related: Materialized; materializing.

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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper