Word.ws English Dictionary

lays the groundwork

lays the groundwork is the third-person singular simple present indicative of lay the groundwork.

Meaning of lay the groundwork

Verb

lay the groundwork (third-person singular simple present lays the groundwork, present participle laying the groundwork, simple past and past participle laid the groundwork)

  1. (figuratively, idiomatic) To create a foundation; to provide the basics or fundamentals.
    • The introductory mathematics courses will lay the groundwork for all your subsequent engineering studies.

Questions about lays the groundwork

What is lays the groundwork the third-person singular simple present indicative of?
Lays the groundwork is the third-person singular simple present indicative of lay the groundwork.

Words near lays the groundwork in the dictionary

  1. lays some skin on
  2. lays something at the door of
  3. lays something at the feet of
  4. lays store by
  5. lays the dust
  6. lays the groundwork
  7. lays the hammer down
  8. lays the smack down
  9. lays the table
  10. lays to
  11. lays to heart

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: lays the groundwork (page history and authors); lay the groundwork (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.

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