Other forms: proceeded, proceeds, proceeding
Proceed is the formal word for carry on, or move forward. It is the voice of announcements and instructions: passengers should proceed to gate 14, please proceed to the checkout, the building work will proceed as planned.
Three shapes are worth learning. Proceed with something means carry on with it — they decided to proceed with the sale. Proceed to do something means go on and do it next, and in speech it carries a faint eye-roll: he apologised, then proceeded to do exactly the same thing. Proceed against someone means take them to court. Mind the relatives: procedure and procession belong to the family, but precede does not mean the same thing at all — precede is to come before. And proceeds, plural and stressed on the first syllable, is the money something brings in: all proceeds go to the hospice.
1verbproceedTo carry on with something already begun.~49%
“Once the paperwork is signed we can proceed.”
formal in this meaning — an editor’s judgement
2verbmoveTo move forward in a particular direction.~33%
“Passengers should proceed to the front of the train.”
formal in this meaning — an editor’s judgement
3verbverbTo go on and do something next.~16%
“She sat down and proceeded to explain the whole plan.”
formal in this meaning — an editor’s judgement
4nounmoneyThe money made from a sale or an event.~2%
“The proceeds from the raffle paid for the new kit.”
Shares are an estimate: a language model read 19 sentences found in the wild and placed 18 of them on a sense (1 were unclear) — a count of our sample, not a measurement of English.
Also accepted in games: continue, go ahead
Latin prōcēdō meant to go forth or advance, and it was built from prō, forth, and cēdō, to go — the same cēdō behind cede and recede. It reached English through Old French proceder and Middle English proceden, keeping the official tone the whole way.
Proto-Indo-European
*per-
Latin
prōcēdō — to go forth, go forward, advance
Old French
proceder
Middle English
proceden
English, today
proceed
Built from
From Middle English proceden, from Old French proceder, from Latin prōcēdō (“to go forth, go forward, advance”), from prō (“forth”) + cēdō (“to go”); see cede.
Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA