phrasal verb (intransitive) · neutral
run out
/rʌn aʊt/RUN·out
speakingtask2
to be used up or finished; to come to an end
Examples
“By the end of the exam I’d completely run out of ideas.”
“My phone contract runs out next month.”
“I ran out of patience during the long presentation.”
Band 8 sentence
“By the time the panel adjourned, our time had quite simply run out, so several questions remained unanswered.”
Collocations
- run out (of) time/patience/ideas
- run out tomorrow/next month
Word family
run verb
Common mistakes
My patience was out.→My patience ran out.
The contract is out next month.→The contract runs out next month.
Say it for a higher band
5finish→6use up→7+run out
Synonyms
be finished
be used up
Easily confused
be out of
“We were out of milk so I went to buy some.”
Related words
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In run …
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