Meaning of purpose in English

This room has a dual purpose, serving as both a study and a dining room.
Let's try to concentrate on the main purpose of this meeting.
The money is intended to be used for specific purposes.
The paper charged her with using the company's money for her own purposes.
You probably think I'm here to deliver your newsletter, but actually I've come for a very different purpose.

SMART Vocabulary: related words and phrases

Goals and purposes

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You can also find related words, phrases, and synonyms in the topics:

Strength of will and determination

(Definition of purpose from the Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary & Thesaurus © Cambridge University Press)

purpose | American Dictionary

purpose

noun

/ˈpɜr·pəs/

purpose noun (REASON)

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[ C/U ]

an intention or aim; a reason for doing something or for allowing something to happen:

[ C ] For budgeting purposes, you really have to start estimating costs now.

[ C ] The delay really served no good purpose and may have harmed the negotiation.

on purpose

If you do something on purpose, you do it intentionally:

This is the second time in a row that he didn’t show up, and I believe he did it on purpose.

[ C/U ]

Purpose is also determination:

[ U ] The project gave him a renewed sense of purpose.

purpose noun (RESULT)

[ C ]

an intended result or use:

This budget is designed to meet one purpose and one purpose only, to do what is best for the economy.

(Definition of purpose from the Cambridge Academic Content Dictionary © Cambridge University Press)

purpose | Business English

purpose

noun

/ˈpɜːpəs/ us

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[ C ]

the reason for doing something or the reason that something exists:

sb's purpose in doing sth My purpose in calling this meeting was to remind everyone of some basic rules.

with/for the purpose of (doing) sth He learnt Chinese for the express purpose of starting a business there.

I went to the conference with the sole purpose of advertising our services.

for tax/business/insurance purposes He pays himself a small salary for tax purposes.

I can see no useful purpose in speaking to him again.

You need to assure shareholders that their investment is being used to good purpose.

[ U ]

determination or a feeling of having a reason for what you do:

You need a strong sense of purpose to start your own company.

[ C ]

a need of a particular person or organization:

We haven't yet managed to find new premises that are suitable for our purposes.

This fabric isn't ideal, but it will serve our purposes.

See also

general-purpose

multi-purpose

on purpose

intentionally, not by accident:

I know you didn't delete the database on purpose, but please be more careful.

serve a purpose

to have a use:

These small village shops serve a very useful purpose.

be to no purpose

to be completely unsuccessful:

All my efforts were to no purpose.

(Definition of purpose from the Cambridge Business English Dictionary © Cambridge University Press)

Examples of purpose

purpose

This evidence suggests that planning and control each serve a specialized purpose utilizing distinct visual representations.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The results of this paper can be important for the study of the behavior of laboratory and space plasmas, and also for diagnostic purposes.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The possibility remains, however, that the pamphlet was not used in performance but served a purely symbolic purpose.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

And finally, what purposes (psychological, social, cultural) does such canon formation serve?

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The health authority's representatives again sought to establish a sense of purpose and to embody this in a method of working.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

A stratified random sample of 1672 individuals was selected for study purposes out of 10 569 residents, stratified by age and gender.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The purpose of this paper is to study the original direction of the radiation excited by electron cyclotron maser instability or the beam-plasma instability.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Although recruits were informed of the purpose of the interview, they were not provided with a copy of the interview schedule in advance.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

But the central question surrounding bower birds was the purpose of the bowers.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

This suggests that it is important for environmental purposes to model the response of technical change to trade.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

They were told that the purpose of the procedure was to observe the child trying to wait.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

Are we being told the whole story, or only that part of it which suits the author's purpose?

From the Cambridge English Corpus

For our present purpose it is enough to ask what quantity the numerical solution is supposed to approximate, at least to a first-order approximation.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The cost of purpose-built manufacturing facilities and chemical synthesis are a critical barrier to the commercial development of many potential pesticides.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

The purpose of this paper is to provide a theoretical framework for adequate assessment procedures to testing foreign language vocabulary.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

These examples are from corpora and from sources on the web. Any opinions in the examples do not represent the opinion of the Cambridge Dictionary editors or of Cambridge University Press or its licensors.

Collocations with purpose

purpose

These are words often used in combination with purpose.

Click on a collocation to see more examples of it.

administrative purpose

The answers given in this test, as in the census itself, will be entirely confidential and will not be used for any other administrative purpose.

From the

Hansard archive

Example from the Hansard archive. Contains Parliamentary information licensed under the Open Parliament Licence v3.0

advertising purposes

The use of packaging for advertising purposes should be discouraged since this may encourage superfluous use of materials.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

aesthetic purpose

Where judges thought an aesthetic purpose was part of a well-reasoned regulatory classification, they could usually find a way to let it slip through.

From the Cambridge English Corpus

See all collocations with purpose

What is the pronunciation of purpose?