"do the trick" meaning in English

See do the trick in All languages combined, or Wiktionary

Verb

Audio: en-au-do the trick.ogg Forms: does the trick [present, singular, third-person], doing the trick [participle, present], did the trick [past], done the trick [participle, past]
Head templates: {{en-verb|do<does,,did,done> the trick}} do the trick (third-person singular simple present does the trick, present participle doing the trick, simple past did the trick, past participle done the trick)
  1. (informal, idiomatic) To work; to be successful; to solve a problem; to be sufficient or adequate to fulfill a purpose. Tags: idiomatic, informal Synonyms: do the job, hit the mark, turn the trick Translations (to work): tepsiä (Finnish), faire l’affaire (French), duga (Icelandic), nægja (Icelandic), robić swoje [imperfective] (Polish), zrobić swoje [perfective] (Polish), działać [imperfective] (Polish), zadziałać [perfective] (Polish), załatwiać sprawę [imperfective] (Polish), załatwić sprawę [perfective] (Polish), göra susen (Swedish)
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      "form": "does the trick",
      "tags": [
        "present",
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        "third-person"
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      "form": "doing the trick",
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      "form": "did the trick",
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      "form": "done the trick",
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      "name": "en-verb"
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  "lang_code": "en",
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      ],
      "examples": [
        {
          "ref": "1885, H. Rider Haggard, chapter 3, in King Solomon's Mines:",
          "text": "[J]ust that little extra second did the trick.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1921, Victor Appleton, chapter 24, in Tom Swift Among The Fire Fighters:",
          "text": "\"It was the chemicals from this young man's airship that did the trick!\"",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2002 April 15, Laura Bradford, “Three Ways To Give Nature A Helping Hand”, in Time:",
          "text": "Sometimes hormone therapy does the trick, but many infertile couples require more sophisticated manipulation of sperm and eggs.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To work; to be successful; to solve a problem; to be sufficient or adequate to fulfill a purpose."
      ],
      "id": "en-do_the_trick-en-verb-y4g-iA34",
      "links": [
        [
          "work",
          "work"
        ],
        [
          "successful",
          "successful"
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        [
          "solve",
          "solve"
        ],
        [
          "problem",
          "problem"
        ],
        [
          "sufficient",
          "sufficient"
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          "adequate",
          "adequate"
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        "(informal, idiomatic) To work; to be successful; to solve a problem; to be sufficient or adequate to fulfill a purpose."
      ],
      "synonyms": [
        {
          "word": "do the job"
        },
        {
          "word": "hit the mark"
        },
        {
          "word": "turn the trick"
        }
      ],
      "tags": [
        "idiomatic",
        "informal"
      ],
      "translations": [
        {
          "code": "fi",
          "lang": "Finnish",
          "sense": "to work",
          "word": "tepsiä"
        },
        {
          "code": "fr",
          "lang": "French",
          "sense": "to work",
          "word": "faire l’affaire"
        },
        {
          "code": "is",
          "lang": "Icelandic",
          "sense": "to work",
          "word": "duga"
        },
        {
          "code": "is",
          "lang": "Icelandic",
          "sense": "to work",
          "word": "nægja"
        },
        {
          "code": "pl",
          "lang": "Polish",
          "sense": "to work",
          "tags": [
            "imperfective"
          ],
          "word": "robić swoje"
        },
        {
          "code": "pl",
          "lang": "Polish",
          "sense": "to work",
          "tags": [
            "perfective"
          ],
          "word": "zrobić swoje"
        },
        {
          "code": "pl",
          "lang": "Polish",
          "sense": "to work",
          "tags": [
            "imperfective"
          ],
          "word": "działać"
        },
        {
          "code": "pl",
          "lang": "Polish",
          "sense": "to work",
          "tags": [
            "perfective"
          ],
          "word": "zadziałać"
        },
        {
          "code": "pl",
          "lang": "Polish",
          "sense": "to work",
          "tags": [
            "imperfective"
          ],
          "word": "załatwiać sprawę"
        },
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          "code": "pl",
          "lang": "Polish",
          "sense": "to work",
          "tags": [
            "perfective"
          ],
          "word": "załatwić sprawę"
        },
        {
          "code": "sv",
          "lang": "Swedish",
          "sense": "to work",
          "word": "göra susen"
        }
      ]
    }
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      "audio": "en-au-do the trick.ogg",
      "mp3_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/transcoded/b/b3/En-au-do_the_trick.ogg/En-au-do_the_trick.ogg.mp3",
      "ogg_url": "https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b3/En-au-do_the_trick.ogg"
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  "word": "do the trick"
}
{
  "forms": [
    {
      "form": "does the trick",
      "tags": [
        "present",
        "singular",
        "third-person"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "doing the trick",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "present"
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    },
    {
      "form": "did the trick",
      "tags": [
        "past"
      ]
    },
    {
      "form": "done the trick",
      "tags": [
        "participle",
        "past"
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  "lang_code": "en",
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          "ref": "1885, H. Rider Haggard, chapter 3, in King Solomon's Mines:",
          "text": "[J]ust that little extra second did the trick.",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "1921, Victor Appleton, chapter 24, in Tom Swift Among The Fire Fighters:",
          "text": "\"It was the chemicals from this young man's airship that did the trick!\"",
          "type": "quote"
        },
        {
          "ref": "2002 April 15, Laura Bradford, “Three Ways To Give Nature A Helping Hand”, in Time:",
          "text": "Sometimes hormone therapy does the trick, but many infertile couples require more sophisticated manipulation of sperm and eggs.",
          "type": "quote"
        }
      ],
      "glosses": [
        "To work; to be successful; to solve a problem; to be sufficient or adequate to fulfill a purpose."
      ],
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        [
          "work",
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        [
          "successful",
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          "sufficient",
          "sufficient"
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          "adequate"
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      "raw_glosses": [
        "(informal, idiomatic) To work; to be successful; to solve a problem; to be sufficient or adequate to fulfill a purpose."
      ],
      "tags": [
        "idiomatic",
        "informal"
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  "synonyms": [
    {
      "word": "do the job"
    },
    {
      "word": "hit the mark"
    },
    {
      "word": "turn the trick"
    }
  ],
  "translations": [
    {
      "code": "fi",
      "lang": "Finnish",
      "sense": "to work",
      "word": "tepsiä"
    },
    {
      "code": "fr",
      "lang": "French",
      "sense": "to work",
      "word": "faire l’affaire"
    },
    {
      "code": "is",
      "lang": "Icelandic",
      "sense": "to work",
      "word": "duga"
    },
    {
      "code": "is",
      "lang": "Icelandic",
      "sense": "to work",
      "word": "nægja"
    },
    {
      "code": "pl",
      "lang": "Polish",
      "sense": "to work",
      "tags": [
        "imperfective"
      ],
      "word": "robić swoje"
    },
    {
      "code": "pl",
      "lang": "Polish",
      "sense": "to work",
      "tags": [
        "perfective"
      ],
      "word": "zrobić swoje"
    },
    {
      "code": "pl",
      "lang": "Polish",
      "sense": "to work",
      "tags": [
        "imperfective"
      ],
      "word": "działać"
    },
    {
      "code": "pl",
      "lang": "Polish",
      "sense": "to work",
      "tags": [
        "perfective"
      ],
      "word": "zadziałać"
    },
    {
      "code": "pl",
      "lang": "Polish",
      "sense": "to work",
      "tags": [
        "imperfective"
      ],
      "word": "załatwiać sprawę"
    },
    {
      "code": "pl",
      "lang": "Polish",
      "sense": "to work",
      "tags": [
        "perfective"
      ],
      "word": "załatwić sprawę"
    },
    {
      "code": "sv",
      "lang": "Swedish",
      "sense": "to work",
      "word": "göra susen"
    }
  ],
  "word": "do the trick"
}

Download raw JSONL data for do the trick meaning in English (3.5kB)


This page is a part of the kaikki.org machine-readable English dictionary. This dictionary is based on structured data extracted on 2025-01-10 from the enwiktionary dump dated 2025-01-01 using wiktextract (df33d17 and 4ed51a5). 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.