Word.ws English Dictionary

spell things out

spell things out verb: to provide simple and understandable details.

Verb

spell things out (third-person singular simple present spells things out, present participle spelling things out, simple past and past participle spelled things out or (chiefly UK) spelt things out)

  1. (intransitive) To provide simple and understandable details.
    • Here is an article that spells things out, so that it is easier to grasp.
    Synonyms:
    spell it out
  2. (intransitive) To be explicit.
    • It used to be that songs could not spell things out, but society is more liberal now.

Synonyms of spell things out

Forms of spell things out

third-person singular presentspells things out
present participlespelling things out
past participlespelled things out
pastspelled things out
past participle UKspelt things out
past UKspelt things out

Questions about spell things out

What does spell things out mean?
Spell things out means to provide simple and understandable details.
What part of speech is spell things out?
Spell things out is a verb.
What is the past tense of spell things out?
The past tense of spell things out is spelled things out.

Words near spell things out in the dictionary

  1. spell off
  2. spell offs
  3. spell one's name
  4. spell out
  5. spell someone's name
  6. spell things out
  7. spell work
  8. spell-bound
  9. spell-casting
  10. spell-castings
  11. spell-check

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: spell things out (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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Cite this entry: “spell things out.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/spell_things_out. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.