to put on
- phrasal verb
- /pʊt ɑn/
- I asked to speak with his manager, but they put me on hold and disconnected me.
Just yeah, put some real miles on those cars.
- Just yeah, put some real miles on those cars.
Examples
-
If you keep driving like this, you'll put on a lot of extra kilometers by the end of the trip.
-
" In one week, you put more miles on that car than I put on in a month.
Fiction book (1996) -
For the the big truck wheels I put on it to do the highway driving.
-
The palace quiets now that the walls are enclosed and the roof is put on.
Fiction book (2002) -
I need to put on some miles before I return the rental car.
-
After taking the scenic route, I realized I had put on over 100 miles on the odometer.
Synonyms
To drive a car without a fixed destination to relax
How Far
Surface Forms
Morphology
put + on
The basic sense 'to dress oneself' is directly derivable from combining 'put' (place) with 'on' (onto the body) and would be clear to a B1 learner who knows both words. However, extended senses like 'put on a show' (to stage/present) or idiomatic uses (e.g. 'put on' meaning to pretend) involve metaphorical extension and phrasal-verb idiosyncrasy that are not fully predictable without exposure.
Etymology
The phrasal verb put on for adding miles comes from the idea of adding distance to a vehicle: when you drive you put miles on the car. That's why it means 'to add miles' to a vehicle.