task
Americannoun
-
tasks
plural
-
a definite piece of work assigned to, falling to, or expected of a person; duty.
- Synonyms:
- assignment, job
-
any piece of work.
- Synonyms:
- assignment, job
-
a matter of considerable labor or difficulty.
-
Obsolete. a tax or impost.
verb (used with object)
-
tasks,
present (3rd person singular)
-
tasked,
past participle, past
-
tasking
present participle
-
to subject to severe or excessive labor or exertion; put a strain upon (powers, resources, etc.).
-
to impose a task on.
-
Obsolete. to tax.
adjective
idioms
noun
-
a specific piece of work required to be done as a duty or chore
-
an unpleasant or difficult job or duty
-
any piece of work
-
to criticize or reprove
verb
-
to assign a task to
-
to subject to severe strain; tax
Synonym Usage
Task, chore, job, assignment refer to a definite and specific instance or act of work. Task and chore and, to a lesser extent, job often imply work that is tiresome, arduous, or otherwise unpleasant. Task usually refers to a clearly defined piece of work, sometimes of short or limited duration, assigned to or expected of a person: the task of pacifying angry customers; a difficult, time-consuming task. A chore is a minor task, usually one of several performed as part of a routine, as in farming, and often more tedious than difficult: the daily chore of taking out the garbage; early morning chores of feeding the livestock. Job is the most general of these terms, referring to almost any work or responsibility, including a person's means of earning a living: the job of washing the windows; a well-paying job in advertising. Assignment refers to a specific task allocated to a person by someone in a position of authority: a homework assignment; a reporter's assignment to cover international news.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
tasksimple
-
taskssimple
-
have taskedperfect
-
has taskedperfect
-
am taskingprogressive
-
are taskingprogressive
-
is taskingprogressive
-
have been taskingperfect progressive
-
has been taskingperfect progressive
Past
-
taskedsimple
-
had taskedperfect
-
was taskingprogressive
-
were taskingprogressive
-
had been taskingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of task
First recorded in 1250–1300; Middle English noun, from Medieval Latin tasca, variant of taxa tax ( def. )
Explanation
A task can be big or small, easy or really hard — but it's never more than a job that needs to get done. Chop chop! There's a task that needs completing, and you're just the person for the job. If you're smart though, you'll figure out a way to task someone else with it, or assign it elsewhere. Task comes to us all the way from the Latin word taxare, which in its earliest days meant "to impose a tax on." So much like the filling out of your tax forms, most tasks are considered chores.
Vocabulary lists containing task
TEKS ELAR Academic Vocabulary List (5th-7th grades)
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Keystone Exams: English Composition Glossary
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Beowulf vocabulary
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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:
AI use is measured in tokens, but the models’ use of tokens at any given task can be unpredictable.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 5, 2026
Federal Trade Commission Chair Andrew Ferguson and Undersecretary of Defense for Research and Engineering Emil Michael will also be part of the task force.
From BBC ● Oct. 5, 2026
These Chargers have 13 games left, and identifying potential wins on the remaining schedule is a nearly impossible task.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 5, 2026
Even the same model might use a different number of tokens each time it completes a task.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 5, 2026
It seemed like an impossible task, but if anyone could succeed, it was the wild robot.
From "The Wild Robot Protects" by Peter Brown
For example, if a patient was unable to attend an appointment, a navigator could notify the doctor, arrange a new appointment, or handle administrative tasks that might otherwise fall to clinical staff.
From Science Daily ● Oct. 6, 2026
We have clear boundaries about roles and tasks, and we’re able to create very pragmatic parameters of what to do when we’re facing a disagreement.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 5, 2026
That means they were assessed by teachers on being able to complete tasks like going to the toilet and paying attention in class.
From BBC ● Oct. 5, 2026
A fall can rob older people of the very independence that they are trying to preserve by carrying out those tasks.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 5, 2026
He realized the numerous ways that they could serve their country by performing socially useful tasks.
From "Hitler Youth: Growing Up in Hitler's Shadow" by Susan Campbell Bartoletti
The people tasked with the job of finding a usable vein and securing an IV are not phlebotomists with specialized training or nurses.
From Salon ● Oct. 3, 2026
Sweden's truth commission, set up in 2021, was tasked with charting and investigating the policies affecting the Sami and their implementation.
From Barron's ● Sep. 30, 2026
For the rest of us, the corrosion of a 37,000-person-strong crimefighting force tasked with investigating everything from terrorism to corruption is arguably a threat to public safety.
From Slate ● Sep. 30, 2026
It was tasked with retrieving information from software operated by a fictional company inside the testing environment.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 18, 2026
The remaining camaradas who weren’t sick were tasked with chopping down some trees to make spare paddles—also at Roosevelt’s insistence.
From "Death on the River of Doubt" by Samantha Seiple
It said it plans to submit a bill "as soon as possible," while tasking an expert group with drawing up permanent regulations on the issue.
From Barron's ● Oct. 5, 2026
The “Ted Lasso” writers aren’t entirely unaware of the most obvious concerns that come with tasking Ted with wrangling a team of disparate female personalities.
From Salon ● Sep. 10, 2026
“Establish any ties between Thomas Lynch and Israel / Jewish heritage,” the June 6 tasking document said.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Apr. 27, 2026
The new material revealed MI5 had greater and earlier knowledge of Stakeknife than detectives had previously been told, including that MI5 had been involved in tasking him.
From BBC ● Jan. 25, 2026
The mountaineers lived on grizzly bears—food which it was impossible to seize without tasking their energies to the utmost.
From The Library and Society Reprints of Papers and Addresses by Arthur Elmore Bostwick
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.
