"could do with" meaning in English

See could do with in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Verb

Forms: could have done with [participle, past]
Head templates: {{head|en|verb|past participle|could have done with}} could do with (past participle could have done with)
  1. To need something that would be beneficial. Related terms: could do without, can do with, can do without, could have done with, could have done without Translations (to need something that would be beneficial): ne pas dire non (French), ráférne (Hungarian), jól jönne neki (Hungarian), elkelne (Hungarian)
    Sense id: en-could_do_with-en-verb-FxAGB5BU Categories (other): English entries with incorrect language header, English positive polarity items

Inflected forms

Download JSON data for could do with meaning in English (2.3kB)

{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "could have done with",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "verb",
        "3": "past participle",
        "4": "could have done with"
      },
      "expansion": "could do with (past participle could have done with)",
      "name": "head"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English entries with incorrect language header",
          "parents": [
            "Entries with incorrect language header",
            "Entry maintenance"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        },
        {
          "kind": "other",
          "name": "English positive polarity items",
          "parents": [
            "Positive polarity items",
            "Terms by semantic function"
          ],
          "source": "w"
        }
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "I could do with a torch, if you've got one.",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "text": "The fence could do with another coat of paint.",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "text": "Your son could do with a good talking to!",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "text": "That cutter is no good to me now. I could have done with it yesterday.",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2019 October 19, Robert Kitson, “England into World Cup semi-finals after bruising victory over Australia”, in The Guardian, London: Guardian News & Media",
          "text": "Jones could still do with Jonny May, the scorer of the first two of England’s four tries, recovering swiftly from an apparent hamstring tweak but in Sinckler and his young flankers, Tom Curry and Sam Underhill, the coach has some steadily improving individuals.",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To need something that would be beneficial."
      ],
      "id": "en-could_do_with-en-verb-FxAGB5BU",
      "links": [
        [
          "need",
          "need"
        ],
        [
          "beneficial",
          "beneficial"
        ]
      ],
      "related": [
        {
          "word": "could do without"
        },
        {
          "word": "can do with"
        },
        {
          "word": "can do without"
        },
        {
          "word": "could have done with"
        },
        {
          "word": "could have done without"
        }
      ],
      "translations": [
        {
          "code": "fr",
          "lang": "French",
          "sense": "to need something that would be beneficial",
          "word": "ne pas dire non"
        },
        {
          "code": "hu",
          "lang": "Hungarian",
          "sense": "to need something that would be beneficial",
          "word": "ráférne"
        },
        {
          "code": "hu",
          "lang": "Hungarian",
          "sense": "to need something that would be beneficial",
          "word": "jól jönne neki"
        },
        {
          "code": "hu",
          "lang": "Hungarian",
          "sense": "to need something that would be beneficial",
          "word": "elkelne"
        }
      ]
    }
  ],
  "word": "could do with"
}
{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "could have done with",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
      ]
    }
  ],
  "head_templates": [
    {
      "args": {
        "1": "en",
        "2": "verb",
        "3": "past participle",
        "4": "could have done with"
      },
      "expansion": "could do with (past participle could have done with)",
      "name": "head"
    }
  ],
  "lang": "English",
  "lang_code": "en",
  "pos": "verb",
  "related": [
    {
      "word": "could do without"
    },
    {
      "word": "can do with"
    },
    {
      "word": "can do without"
    },
    {
      "word": "could have done with"
    },
    {
      "word": "could have done without"
    }
  ],
  "senses": [
    {
      "categories": [
        "English entries with incorrect language header",
        "English lemmas",
        "English multiword terms",
        "English positive polarity items",
        "English terms with quotations",
        "English terms with usage examples",
        "English verbs"
      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "text": "I could do with a torch, if you've got one.",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "text": "The fence could do with another coat of paint.",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "text": "Your son could do with a good talking to!",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "text": "That cutter is no good to me now. I could have done with it yesterday.",
          "type": "example"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2019 October 19, Robert Kitson, “England into World Cup semi-finals after bruising victory over Australia”, in The Guardian, London: Guardian News & Media",
          "text": "Jones could still do with Jonny May, the scorer of the first two of England’s four tries, recovering swiftly from an apparent hamstring tweak but in Sinckler and his young flankers, Tom Curry and Sam Underhill, the coach has some steadily improving individuals.",
          "type": "quotation"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To need something that would be beneficial."
      ],
      "links": [
        [
          "need",
          "need"
        ],
        [
          "beneficial",
          "beneficial"
        ]
      ]
    }
  ],
  "translations": [
    {
      "code": "fr",
      "lang": "French",
      "sense": "to need something that would be beneficial",
      "word": "ne pas dire non"
    },
    {
      "code": "hu",
      "lang": "Hungarian",
      "sense": "to need something that would be beneficial",
      "word": "ráférne"
    },
    {
      "code": "hu",
      "lang": "Hungarian",
      "sense": "to need something that would be beneficial",
      "word": "jól jönne neki"
    },
    {
      "code": "hu",
      "lang": "Hungarian",
      "sense": "to need something that would be beneficial",
      "word": "elkelne"
    }
  ],
  "word": "could do with"
}

This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2024-05-06 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2024-05-02 using wiktextract (f4fd8c9 and c9440ce). The data shown on this site has been post-processed and various details (e.g., extra categories) removed, some information disambiguated, and additional data merged from other sources. See the raw data download page for the unprocessed wiktextract data.

If you use this data in academic research, please cite Tatu Ylonen: Wiktextract: Wiktionary as Machine-Readable Structured Data, Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC), pp. 1317-1325, Marseille, 20-25 June 2022. Linking to the relevant page(s) under https://kaikki.org would also be greatly appreciated.