Meaning & use
organise
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Meanings
verbtransitive
To arrange things or information in a sensible order or structure so they are easy to find or use.
Grammar: Takes an object: organise your notes.
Patterns
- organise something
- organise something into something
- organise something by something
She spent the weekend organising her bookshelves by author.
He organised the photos into folders named after each year.
If you organise your day well, you can finish before dinner.
verbtransitive
To plan and arrange an event or activity, making sure all the practical details are dealt with.
Grammar: Takes an object: organise a trip.
Patterns
- organise something for someone
- organise something for somewhere
The students organised a bake sale to raise money for the school.
Could you organise a taxi to the airport for Friday?
Our neighbours organised a street party for the holiday.
verbtransitive or intransitive
To form a group of people, such as workers, into a union or association so they can act together.
Grammar: Can take an object (organise workers) or stand alone (they organised for better pay).
Patterns
- organise workers
- organise for something
Warehouse staff began to organise after their hours were cut.
The union has organised thousands of nurses in the region.
Local residents organised to stop the road being widened.
Word forms
| third person singular | organises |
|---|---|
| past tense | organised |
| past participle | organised |
| -ing form | organising |
Common combinations
- organise a meeting
- I'll organise a meeting with the whole team on Monday.
- organise your time
- Learning to organise your time makes exams less stressful.
- organise a protest
- They organised a peaceful protest outside the town hall.
- organise things alphabetically
- The librarian organised the files alphabetically.
- organise yourself
- Organise yourself before the deadline gets close.
- well organised
- The conference was very well organised.
Synonyms and how they differ
- arrange
- Arrange is broader and often means fixing details of a plan (arrange a meeting), while organise suggests more effort and structure.
- sort
- Sort means putting things into groups or categories, so it is narrower than organise, which can also mean planning an event.
- coordinate
- Coordinate stresses making different people or parts work together smoothly, whereas organise can be done by one person alone.
- arrange
- Used for the planning sense, arrange sounds lighter and more casual than organise.
Opposites
Word family
- organisation noun
- a group set up for a purpose, or the act of arranging things
- organiser noun
- a person who plans an event, or a diary or planner
- organised adjective
- well planned, or good at planning
- disorganised adjective
- badly planned or untidy
- organic adjective
- relating to living things or grown without artificial chemicals
Commonly confused: organise or organize? organise or arrange?
organise vs organize
This is the American spelling of the same verb, not a different word.
organise vs arrange
Arrange often means to fix a time or put things in a position, while organise suggests building a whole system or event.
Practice
Which sentence uses the British spelling of the verb correctly?
Choose one answer.
Organise is the British spelling. Organize is the American form, so it is not wrong English but it does not match the British spelling asked for; the other two are misspellings.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “organise”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.