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say it: di-VEL-uhp
develop is a verb meaning "make something new, such as a product or a mental or artistic creation". It carries 21 recorded senses.
come into existence; take on form or shape
“A new religious movement originated in that country”
“a love that sprang up from friendship”
“the idea for the book grew out of a short story”
“An interesting phenomenon uprose”
create by training and teaching
“The old master is training world-class violinists”
“we develop the leaders for the future”
grow, progress, unfold, or evolve through a process of evolution, natural growth, differentiation, or a conducive environment
“A flower developed on the branch”
“The country developed into a mighty superpower”
“The embryo develops into a fetus”
“This situation has developed over a long time”
make visible by means of chemical solutions
“Please develop this roll of film for me”
photography
superimpose a three-dimensional surface on a plane without stretching, in geometry
move one's pieces into strategically more advantageous positions
“Spassky developed quickly”
chess
elaborate by the unfolding of a musical idea and by the working out of the rhythmic and harmonic changes in the theme
“develop the melody and change the key”
happen
“Report the news as it develops”
“These political movements recrudesce from time to time”
Forms marked · are formed by the regular rule rather than recorded in the source data. English keeps a few hundred irregulars and the rest follow the pattern, so the rule is right far more often than not — but it is a rule, and the mark says so.
Definitions, synonyms and semantic relations for develop come from Princeton University’s WordNet. The pronunciation comes from the CMU Pronouncing Dictionary. Commonness is measured against a corpus of everyday English. Full sources and licences.