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Glite Dictionary
🔥 To destroy by fire 📉 To reduce work
to burn down

to burn down

1 3.9
To reduce work left in a project
  • phrasal verb
  • /bɜrn daʊn/
  • Jargon
translation icon : reducir
  • To ensure a smooth project completion, we need to burn down the backlog items efficiently.

Examples

  • The project manager emphasized the importance of burning down all outstanding issues during their review.

  • We've got to burn down each display ourselves.

    Waxwork (1988)

  • The team worked hard to burn down the remaining tasks in the sprint before the deadline.

Synonyms

to run down
vsto burn down
15 3.2

To use up batteries, money or supplies until little remains

is a planned reduction of remaining tasks tracked in project management

Antonyms

to add
∞ 1.0

Include something extra to make something larger or better

to expand
805 2.5

To grow larger in size, amount, or importance

How Much Work

to complete
∞ 1.0
to clear
  • Specialized
24 4.9
to burn down
  • Jargon
1 3.9
to work through
152 3.4

Surface Forms

burn down infinitive
burned down past
burned down past participle
burning down present participle
burns down third person singular

Morphology

burn + down

The Agile sense 'to reduce remaining work' is a metaphorical extension of 'burn' (remove/eliminate) combined with 'down' (decrease), so there is some compositional motivation. However, the dominant literal reading is 'destroy by fire' and the project-management meaning is specialised jargon that a B1 learner would not reliably infer without context, making the relation only partially transparent.

Etymology

Burn down in project work uses the image of a fire slowly eating a pile of fuel or tasks until only ash remains, with the pile getting smaller as it is burned down. So in this context burn down means 'to reduce the amount of remaining work'.