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Enable vs Extend - What's the difference?

enable | extend |

As verbs the difference between enable and extend

is that enable is to give strength or ability to; to make firm and strong while extend is to increase in extent.

enable

English

(Webster 1913)

Verb

(enabling) (enabl)
  • To give strength or ability to; to make firm and strong.
  • * 1611 , King James Bible , "1 Tim. i. 12"
  • Who hath enabled me.
  • To make able (to do, or to be, something); to confer sufficient power upon; to furnish with means, opportunities, and the like; to render competent for; to empower; to endow.
  • * 1711 , October 13, (Joseph Addison), (The Spectator) , number 195
  • Temperance gives Nature her full play, and enables her to exert herself in all her force and vigor.
  • * {{quote-magazine, date=2013-06-29, volume=407, issue=8842, page=72-3, magazine=(The Economist)
  • , title= A punch in the gut , passage=Mostly, the microbiome is beneficial. It helps with digestion and enables people to extract a lot more calories from their food than would otherwise be possible. Research over the past few years, however, has implicated it in diseases from atherosclerosis to asthma to autism.}}
  • To allow a way out or excuse for an action.
  • Antonyms

    * disable

    Derived terms

    * enabler * enablement * re-enable * reenable

    Anagrams

    *

    extend

    English

    Verb

    (en verb)
  • To increase in extent.
  • To possess a certain extent.
  • To cause to increase in extent.
  • To cause to last for a longer period of time.
  • To straighten (a limb).
  • To bestow; to offer; to impart; to apply.
  • to extend sympathy to the suffering
  • To increase in quantity by weakening or adulterating additions.
  • to extend liquors
  • (UK, legal) To value, as lands taken by a writ of extent in satisfaction of a debt; to assign by writ of extent.
  • Synonyms

    * enlarge * expand * increase * lengthen * stretch * widen

    Derived terms

    * extendible (adjective) * extensible (adjective) * extensive (adjective) * extension * extent

    Anagrams

    *