Other forms: invested, investing, invests
To invest is to put money into something in the hope that it grows. Invest in shares, invest the money, a good investment.
The preposition is in. It also means to put time or effort into something: invest years in a project, emotionally invested. And formally it means to give somebody an office or rank — invested as chancellor — which is the oldest sense. Note investment; investor; and that invest and vest are the same word, from clothing somebody in the robes of office.
1verbinvestTo put money into something hoping it grows.
“She invested her savings in property and rented out two flats.”
2verbtimeTo put time or effort into something.
“He invested a lot of time in learning Japanese before moving to Tokyo.”
invest is a putting in.
Latin investire means to clothe, from vestis, a garment. Investing somebody with an office meant literally putting the robes on them, and the financial sense came through Italian, from the idea of clothing money in a new form.
Latin
investio
Middle French
investir
English, today
invest
Built from
Borrowed from Middle French investir, from Latin investio. Borrowed from Middle French investir or Medieval Latin investire, from Latin investio (“to clothe, cover”), from in- (“in, on”) + vestio (“to clothe, dress”), from vestis (“clothing”); see vest. The sense “to spend money etc.” probably via Italian investire, of the same root.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA