Word.ws English Dictionary

get started

get started verb: to begin an activity.

Verb

get started (third-person singular simple present gets started, present participle getting started, simple past got started, past participle (UK) got started or (US) gotten started)

  1. (intransitive) To begin an activity.
    • Come on guys, settle down, it's time to get started
  2. (transitive) To begin (an activity or event); to get something to start.
    • Get the car started and then we can set off.
  3. (idiomatic, transitive) To cause (someone) to start talking about something in length.
    • He is also an avid photographer and falconer. Don't get him started talking about his birds because he won't stop for a while.2015, A. J. Marcus, Grizzly Discovery

Forms of get started

third-person singular presentgets started
present participlegetting started
pastgot started
past participle UKgot started
past participle USgotten started

Questions about get started

What does get started mean?
Get started means to begin an activity.
What part of speech is get started?
Get started is a verb.
What is the past tense of get started?
The past tense of get started is got started.

Words near get started in the dictionary

  1. get someone's neurons firing
  2. get someone's number
  3. get someone's shirt out
  4. get something over with
  5. get something twisted
  6. get started
  7. get straight
  8. get stuck in
  9. get stuck into
  10. get stuffed
  11. get sturdy

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: get started (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-au-get started.ogg, en-us-get started.ogg.

Cite this entry: “get started.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/get_started. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.