recruit
Americannoun
-
recruits
plural
-
a newly enlisted or drafted member of the armed forces.
-
a new member of a group, organization, or the like.
-
a fresh supply of something.
verb (used with object)
-
recruits,
present (3rd person singular)
-
recruited,
past participle, past
-
recruiting
present participle
-
to enlist (a person) for service in one of the armed forces.
-
to raise (a force) by enlistment.
-
to strengthen or supply (an armed force) with new members.
-
to furnish or replenish with a fresh supply; renew.
-
to renew or restore (the health, strength, etc.).
-
to attempt to acquire the services of (a person) for an employer.
She recruits executives for all the top companies.
-
to attempt to enroll or enlist (a member, affiliate, student, or the like).
a campaign to recruit new club members.
-
to seek to enroll (an athlete) at a school or college, often with an offer of an athletic scholarship.
verb (used without object)
-
recruits,
present (3rd person singular)
-
recruited,
past participle, past
-
recruiting
present participle
-
to enlist persons for service in one of the armed forces.
-
to engage in finding and attracting employees, new members, students, athletes, etc.
-
to recover health, strength, etc.
-
to gain new supplies of anything lost or wasted.
verb
-
-
to enlist (men) for military service
-
to raise or strengthen (an army, navy, etc) by enlistment
-
-
(tr) to enrol or obtain (members, support, etc)
-
to furnish or be furnished with a fresh supply; renew
-
archaic to recover (health, strength, spirits, etc)
noun
-
a newly joined member of a military service
-
any new member or supporter
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Participles
Conjugated Forms
Present
-
recruitsimple
-
recruitssimple
-
have recruitedperfect
-
has recruitedperfect
-
am recruitingprogressive
-
are recruitingprogressive
-
is recruitingprogressive
-
have been recruitingperfect progressive
-
has been recruitingperfect progressive
Past
-
recruitedsimple
-
had recruitedperfect
-
was recruitingprogressive
-
were recruitingprogressive
-
had been recruitingperfect progressive
Future
Etymology
Origin of recruit
First recorded in 1635–45; from French, stem of recruter, derivative of recrue “new growth,” noun use of feminine past participle of recroître ( re- re- + croître, from Latin crēscere “to grow”; cf. crescent)
Explanation
To recruit means to get someone to join something. You might recruit people for the navy or you might recruit members for your quilting group. The verb recruit often refers to formally joining an organization or a group, such as the military or a corporation. It can also be used more broadly to refer to getting someone to participate in a cause, formal or otherwise, like when you recruit your friend to help paint your room. As a noun, recruit means "a person who has been recruited." If you just joined the Army, you're a new recruit.
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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:
When she wasn’t going door-to-door to recruit new members, Huerta negotiated with growers and created union hiring halls.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 28, 2026
The Times said Kurtz also urged a Democrat to quit the race after the August primary, opening a place on the four-candidate ranked-choice ballot for Republican Gerald Heikes, also a recruit.
From Barron's ● Oct. 28, 2026
Original Celebrity Traitor Maya Jama, latest recruit King Kenny and now even the reluctant James Acaster - hurrah! - have developed a real appetite for murder this week.
From BBC ● Oct. 23, 2026
And having just watched his new expansion team fail to win a game in its first season, he proposed Brock recruit other models to be cheerleaders and liven things up.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 23, 2026
And then I saw the recruit, the old man, and the little boy.
From "Salt to the Sea" by Ruta Sepetys
Military fatigues are worn like a badge of honor in Jerusalem’s historic center, where young recruits sling automatic weapons over their shoulders.
From Slate ● Oct. 28, 2026
By the end of Instacart’s fictional boot camp, the male recruits have learned to identify ripe bananas, read expiration dates and make sensible substitutions.
From Salon ● Oct. 25, 2026
The decision comes as ICE is quietly shedding many of the 12,000 new recruits it hired last year.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 14, 2026
The idea is to test how recruits think on their feet and handle conversations with McKinsey clients, some of them more inquisitive or difficult than others.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 14, 2026
He had seemed so dazed—just like the special recruits on their first day—and then so disturbed when the boys asked him about special privileges.
From "The Mysterious Benedict Society" by Trenton Lee Stewart
Heikes told the paper he was recruited by a Midwesterner who he did not think resembled a photo of Kurtz.
From Barron's ● Oct. 28, 2026
U.S. officials believe a branch of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps recruited British nationals to carry out the planned attack.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 27, 2026
He is also the agent who recruited Slovenian model Melania Knauss, helping with her housing and immigration status; he claims he’s the one who introduced her to her future husband.
From Slate ● Oct. 27, 2026
Participants were recruited through dental clinics, pediatric medical practices, and Head Start and Early Head Start programs in Michigan, New York, and Iowa.
From Science Daily ● Oct. 26, 2026
His name was George Papadimitriou, and he was the professor of Byzantine history who had first recruited her for Oakley Street two years before.
From "The Book of Dust: La Belle Sauvage" by Philip Pullman
The New York Times' investigation noted that recruiting candidates to split an opponent's vote -- a practice known as ballot stacking -- is generally legal and has been used by both parties in Alaska.
From Barron's ● Oct. 30, 2026
But there’s also something revealing about recruiting people to perform a form of labor that society has never been especially consistent about expecting everyone to learn.
From Salon ● Oct. 25, 2026
United have invested enormous amounts of money in recruiting a lot of players in the past five years.
From BBC ● Oct. 25, 2026
The findings arrive as California faces the challenge of maintaining quality across its rapidly expanded TK system, including recruiting teachers with the training and experience to work with young children.
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 22, 2026
Oppenheimer did a lot of the recruiting personally.
From "Bomb" by Steve Sheinkin
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