Phrasal verbs are an important feature of the English language. Their importance lies in the fact that they form such a key part of everyday English. Not only are they used in spoken and informal English, but they are also a common aspect of written and even formal English. Understanding and learning to use phrasal verbs, however, is often problematic and there are many reasons for this. The meaning of a phrasal verb, for example, often bears no relation to the meaning of either the verb or the particle which is used with it. This means that phrasal verbs can be difficult both to understand and to remember. Neither does it help that many phrasal verbs have several different meanings, nor that their syntactic behaviour is often unpredictable.

The Cambridge International Dictionary of Phrasal Verbs
addresses all the problems associated with this rich and complex area of the English language and presents information in a way which is clear and helpful. Full coverage is given of British, American and Australian English, making this a truly international dictionary. Information on the grammatical structure of each phrasal verb is presented in an explicit fashion which does not require the user to decipher complex codes. Clear and precise definitions have been written using a carefully controlled defining vocabulary of under 2000 words. Every phrasal verb is illustrated with examples based on sentences from the Cambridge International Corpus, ensuring that they reflect natural written and spoken English.