100 Phrasal Verbs for Everyday Use with Examples and PDF

Hello, English learners! Would you like to understand everyday conversations more easily and speak English more naturally? Learning phrasal verbs for everyday use is an excellent place to start.

Phrasal verbs are combinations of a verb and one or more particles, such as get up, look after, run out of and look forward to. They are extremely common in spoken English, films, television programmes, workplaces and informal writing.

In this lesson, you will learn 100 useful everyday phrasal verbs organised into practical topics, including communication, work, study, travel, relationships, shopping, home life, emotions and problem-solving. Every phrasal verb comes with a clear meaning and a natural example sentence.

At the end of the lesson, you can download a free 100 Phrasal Verbs for Everyday Use Practice Workbook, containing exercises, revision tests and a complete answer key.

Let’s get started!

Table of Contents

General Phrasal Verbs for Everyday Use

Phrasal Verb	Meaning	Example
get up	leave your bed after sleeping	She usually gets up as soon as her alarm rings.
wake up	stop sleeping	I normally wake up at seven in the morning.
put on	place clothing on your body	He put on his jacket before leaving the house.
take off	remove clothing from your body	Please take off your wet shoes at the door.
turn on	start a device or supply of electricity	Could you turn on the kettle?
turn off	stop a device or supply of electricity	Do not forget to turn off the lights.
set off	begin a journey	We set off early to avoid the morning traffic.
come back	return to a place	He came back from work later than usual.
go out	leave home for entertainment or social activity	We are going out for dinner tonight.
stay in	remain at home rather than go out	Let’s stay in and watch a film.

Communication Phrasal Verbs

Phrasal verb	Meaning	Example sentence
speak up	speak more loudly	Could you speak up, please? I cannot hear you.
pipe down	stop talking or become quieter	Please pipe down. The baby is sleeping.
chat up	talk to someone in a flirtatious way	He was trying to chat her up at the party.
go on	continue speaking	Go on. I am listening.
hang up	end a telephone call	She hung up before I could explain.
get through to	successfully contact someone by telephone	I finally got through to the doctor’s surgery.
ring up	telephone someone	I will ring you up when I arrive.
drop by	visit someone informally and usually briefly	Helen dropped by for a quick cup of tea.
pop in	make a short informal visit	I popped in to see my neighbour on the way home.
catch up with	exchange news with someone you have not seen recently	I met Emma for coffee to catch up with her.

Work and Study Phrasal Verbs

Phrasal verb	Meaning	Example sentence
look into	investigate something	The manager is looking into the complaint.
fill in	complete a form by writing information	Please fill in this application form.
hand in	submit a piece of work	I handed in my essay before the deadline.
take on	accept work or responsibility	She has taken on several new responsibilities.
get ahead	make progress or become successful	He works hard because he wants to get ahead in his career.
knuckle down	begin working seriously and with determination	You need to knuckle down if you want to pass the exam.
catch on	begin to understand something	The new software seemed difficult, but I soon caught on.
drop out	leave a course before completing it	He dropped out of university during his second year.
go over	review or examine something carefully	Let’s go over your answers before the test.
brush up on	improve your knowledge of something previously learnt	I need to brush up on my French before the holiday.

Travel Phrasal Verbs

Phrasal verb	Meaning	Example sentence
get on	enter a bus, train, plane or other large vehicle	We got on the bus outside the station.
get off	leave a bus, train, plane or other large vehicle	You need to get off at the next stop.
check in	register at a hotel or airport	We checked in two hours before our flight.
check out	leave a hotel after paying	The guests must check out by eleven o’clock.
lift off	leave the ground and begin flying	The aircraft lifted off shortly after nine.
touch down	land on the ground	We touched down in London ahead of schedule.
hold up	delay someone or something	We were held up by heavy traffic.
set out	begin a journey or activity	The walkers set out just after sunrise.
pick up	collect someone and take them somewhere	Could you pick me up from the station?
drop off	take someone somewhere and leave them there	I will drop you off outside the hotel.

Relationship Phrasal Verbs

Phrasal verb	Meaning	Example sentence
get on with	have a good relationship with someone	I get on well with most of my colleagues.
fall out with	argue with someone and stop being friendly	She fell out with her sister over money.
make up	become friendly again after an argument	They argued yesterday, but they have already made up.
split up	end a romantic relationship	They split up after living together for three years.
ask out	invite someone on a romantic date	Daniel finally asked her out for dinner.
break up	end a romantic relationship	They broke up shortly before Christmas.
hit it off	like each other immediately	We hit it off as soon as we met.
grow apart	gradually become less close	The two childhood friends grew apart over the years.
move in with	begin sharing a home with someone	Sophie moved in with her partner last month.
settle down	begin living a calmer and more stable life	He wants to travel before he settles down.

Money and Shopping Phrasal Verbs

Phrasal verb	Meaning	Example sentence
pay back	return borrowed money	I will pay you back at the end of the week.
save up for	gradually collect money for something	She is saving up for a new laptop.
splash out on	spend a lot of money on something enjoyable	We splashed out on a weekend at a luxury hotel.
rip off	charge someone too much or treat them dishonestly	That garage ripped us off by charging for unnecessary repairs.
shop around	compare prices before buying something	It is worth shopping around before choosing a new phone.
fork out for	reluctantly pay a large amount of money	I had to fork out for a new washing machine.
sell out	have no more of a product available	The concert tickets sold out in ten minutes.
pick out	choose something from a group	She picked out a beautiful scarf for her mother.
try on	put on clothing to see whether it fits	Can I try on these trousers?
pop out	leave for a short time	I am just popping out to the shops.

Phrasal Verbs for Home Life

Phrasal verb	Meaning	Example sentence
clean up	make a place clean and tidy	We had to clean up after the party.
clear out	remove unwanted things from a place	I spent the weekend clearing out the garage.
sort out	organise something or deal with a problem	We need to sort out the electricity bill.
throw away	put something in the rubbish because it is no longer wanted	She threw away several old magazines.
put away	return something to its proper place	Please put away your clothes.
fold up	fold something into a smaller shape	He folded up the blanket and placed it in the cupboard.
warm up	make food or a place warmer	I will warm up the soup for lunch.
cool down	become less hot	Leave the cake to cool down before serving it.
look after	take care of someone or something	Could you look after my cat while I am away?
drop round	visit someone informally	I will drop round later with the book.

Phrasal Verbs for Emotions and Reactions

Phrasal verb	Meaning	Example sentence
calm down	become less upset or angry	Take a deep breath and calm down.
cheer up	become happier	She bought him some chocolates to cheer him up.
let down	disappoint someone	I trusted him, but he let me down.
get over	recover from an illness or upsetting experience	She is still getting over a bad cold.
hold back	stop yourself from showing an emotion	He tried to hold back his tears.
blow up	suddenly become extremely angry	My manager blew up when he saw the mistake.
turn against	stop supporting or liking someone	Some members of the team eventually turned against their leader.
put off	make someone lose interest or enthusiasm	The unpleasant smell put me off my meal.
open up	begin talking honestly about your feelings	He found it difficult to open up about his childhood.
bottle up	hide your feelings instead of expressing them	You should not bottle up your emotions.

Phrasal Verbs for Problems and Solutions

Phrasal verb	Meaning	Example sentence
work out	find a solution to a problem	Do not worry. We will work it out together.
figure out	understand or solve something	I cannot figure out how this machine works.
back up	support someone or confirm what they say	Do not worry. I will back you up in the meeting.
carry on	continue doing something	Please carry on with your work.
give up	stop trying	Do not give up after one unsuccessful attempt.
run out of	use all of something so that none remains	We have run out of milk.
come up with	think of an idea or solution	She came up with an excellent suggestion.
deal with	take action to solve or manage something	I will deal with the complaint tomorrow.
hold on	wait for a short time	Hold on a moment while I find your file.
catch up on	do something that you did not have time to do earlier	I need to catch up on some paperwork.

Social and Everyday Phrasal Verbs

Phrasal verb	Meaning	Example sentence
join in	participate in an activity	Why do you not join in the game?
show up	arrive at a place	He showed up half an hour late.
turn up	arrive or appear	Only twelve people turned up for the meeting.
look out	be careful because there is danger	Look out! There is a car coming.
come in	enter a room or building	Please come in and take a seat.
go off	suddenly make a noise, explode or begin operating	My alarm went off at six o’clock.
give in	stop resisting or finally agree	She eventually gave in and apologised.
stand up for	defend someone or something	You should stand up for what you believe in.
look forward to	feel pleased and excited about something in the future	I am looking forward to the weekend.
go down well	receive a positive reaction	His speech went down well with the audience.

Separable and Inseparable Phrasal Verbs

Some phrasal verbs are separable. This means that a noun can appear either after the complete phrasal verb or between the verb and the particle:

Turn off the television.
Turn the television off.

When the object is a pronoun, it normally goes between the verb and the particle:

Turn it off.
Pick me up.
Cheer him up.

Other phrasal verbs are inseparable, which means that the verb and particle must remain together:

She looks after her grandmother.
We ran out of milk.
I am looking forward to the holiday.

The best way to learn phrasal verbs is to record the complete expression, its meaning and an example sentence.

Download the Free Phrasal Verbs Practice Workbook

Would you like to practise all 100 phrasal verbs from this lesson?

Download the free 100 Phrasal Verbs Practice Workbook in PDF here. It includes matching activities, gap-filling exercises, multiple-choice questions, sentence transformations, short dialogues, speaking prompts, revision tests and a complete answer key.

Use it for self-study, classroom practice or exam preparation.

Learn Phrasal Verbs through Stories

Would you like to see these expressions used in memorable situations rather than isolated sentences?

Explore my phrasal-verb books and complete bundle. Each book uses engaging stories, vocabulary explanations and practical exercises to help you understand, remember and use phrasal verbs confidently.

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Categories: English VocabularyPhrasal Verbs

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