If you want to sound more natural when you speak English, learning more sophisticated vocabulary isn’t always the answer. Sometimes, a much more effective approach is learning how to combine the words you already know in the way English speakers naturally combine them. This is where collocations become particularly useful.
Collocations are combinations of words that commonly occur together in a language. Learning them can help you move beyond simply knowing the meaning of individual words and start building ready-to-use pieces of language that are easier to retrieve when you speak.
In this article, we’ll look at what collocations are, why they’re important for intermediate and upper-intermediate learners, and 10 common B1–B2 collocations that you can use in a wide range of real-life conversations. Most importantly, we’ll look at the patterns around them so that you can start creating your own sentences rather than simply memorising another vocabulary list.
What exactly is a collocation?
A collocation is a combination of words that naturally go together. Think about the word decision, for example. In English, we normally say make a decision, rather than do a decision. Both make and do are extremely common words, and an intermediate learner probably understands both perfectly well. The challenge is knowing which words naturally go together.
The same thing happens throughout the English language. We say heavy rain, strongly recommend, pay attention, make an effort and take a break. In many cases, none of the individual words is particularly difficult. What makes the combination useful is knowing how those familiar words are conventionally put together.
This is an important distinction because speaking naturally isn’t simply a question of knowing increasingly advanced vocabulary. You might know the meaning of hundreds of individual words but still hesitate when you need to combine them in a sentence. Learning collocations gives you larger units of language to work with and can make those combinations easier to retrieve during a conversation.
Why are collocations important for speaking?
Imagine that you’ve learnt the word decision. You understand its meaning, recognise it immediately when you read it and know how to pronounce it. That’s useful knowledge, but when you want to use decision in conversation, you need more information. You need to know, for example, that you can make a decision, reach a decision, talk about an important decision or wonder whether you’ve made the right decision.
This is why learning only decision gives you less usable information than learning make a decision. The same principle applies to many other words. Instead of learning only attention, learn pay attention. Instead of learning effort, notice make an effort. Instead of learning chance in isolation, learn combinations such as have a good chance of doing something.
In other words, collocations give your brain combinations that can be practised and retrieved as larger pieces of language. This can reduce the amount of work you have to do while constructing a sentence and help your English sound more natural at the same time.
So, which collocations are particularly useful at B1–B2 level? Here are ten that can be used across a wide range of everyday situations.
- Make a difference
Make a difference means to have an important effect on something or someone. It’s an extremely flexible collocation because you can use it when talking about work, health, learning, relationships, habits and many other areas of everyday life. You might say, “Practising English for 15 minutes every day can make a big difference,” or “Getting enough sleep really makes a difference to how I feel.”
A useful pattern to remember is something makes a difference to something. For example, Planning my week makes a big difference to my productivity. Instead of memorising the expression on its own, think about your own life and ask yourself: What makes a big difference to me? Your answer immediately gives you a personal example to practise.
- Take something into account
To take something into account means to consider a particular fact or circumstance when you’re thinking about a situation or making a decision. It’s a particularly useful collocation because we constantly need to consider different factors when talking about work, money, travel, plans and everyday decisions.
For example, you might say, “You need to take the cost into account before making a decision,” or “We should take everyone’s opinion into account.” If you’re considering a new job, you could say, When choosing a job, you need to take the working hours into account.
The useful pattern here is take + something + into account. To personalise it, think about a decision you’re currently making and ask yourself what factors you need to consider. Then complete the sentence “I need to take _____ into account.”
- Have a good chance
If you have a good chance of doing something, you believe that something is reasonably likely to happen. You might say, “I think we have a good chance of winning,” “She has a good chance of passing the exam,” or “We have a good chance of finishing on time.”
Here, the grammatical pattern around the collocation is particularly important: have a good chance of + -ing. We say a good chance of finding, a good chance of getting, a good chance of passing. Try completing the sentence “I think I have a good chance of…” with something relevant to your own life.
- Make an effort
To make an effort means to try hard to do something, which makes this collocation useful when talking about work, learning, relationships, habits and personal goals. For example, you could say, “I’m making an effort to speak more English,” “I’m making an effort to exercise more,” or “I’m making an effort to spend less money.”
The useful structure here is make an effort to + verb. Rather than learning effort as an isolated noun, learning the whole pattern gives you something you can immediately adapt: I’m making an effort to go to bed earlier, I’m making an effort to keep in touch with my friends, or I’m making an effort to cook more often. Think about something you’re currently trying to improve and complete the sentence “I’m making an effort to…”
- Make a point
To make a point means to express an idea or opinion that you think is important or worth considering. It’s particularly useful when talking about discussions, meetings, conversations and different opinions. For example, you might say, “She made a really interesting point during the discussion,” or “I think you made a good point about working from home.”
You’ll often hear this collocation with adjectives such as good, interesting, important or valid: make a good point, make an interesting point, make an important point. If someone says something during a conversation that makes you reconsider an issue, you could say, That’s a good point or later tell someone, She made a good point about the cost of living.
This is a useful example of why collocations are worth learning as combinations. The word point has many meanings in English, but learning make a point gives you a ready-made expression that can be used in discussions and conversations.
- Keep in mind
Keep in mind is a useful way of telling someone to remember or consider a particular fact. You’ll often hear it when people are giving advice, explaining something or adding information that could affect a decision. For example, “Keep in mind that prices are usually higher in summer,” or “You should keep in mind that learning a language takes time.”
One of the easiest patterns to remember is keep in mind that + sentence. Once you know this pattern, you can use it in countless situations: Keep in mind that the shops close early on Sundays, Keep in mind that traffic can be heavy in the morning, or Keep in mind that everyone learns at a different pace.
- Deal with a problem
To deal with something means to handle a situation, difficulty or problem. It’s an especially useful expression because problems and challenges naturally come up in conversations about work, family, travel and everyday life. You might say, “I had to deal with a difficult customer at work,” “We need to deal with this problem as soon as possible,” or ask someone, “How do you deal with stress?”
The basic pattern is deal with + problem, situation or person. It can also be used to create natural conversation questions: How do you deal with difficult people? How do you deal with problems at work? How do you deal with stressful situations? Learning one collocation can therefore give you several useful ways to talk about your own experiences and ask other people about theirs.
- Make the most of
To make the most of something means to use a situation, opportunity or period of time in the best possible way. This is a particularly versatile expression because you can make the most of your time, make the most of an opportunity, make the most of your holiday or even make the most of a difficult situation.
For example, imagine you’re visiting a city for only two days. You might say, “We only have two days here, so let’s make the most of them.” Before a trip, you could say, “I want to make the most of my time in London.” And when talking about an opportunity, you might tell someone, “You should make the most of this opportunity.”
The pattern is simply make the most of + something, which makes it very easy to adapt. Think about something in your own life that you want to use or enjoy as fully as possible and complete the sentence “I want to make the most of…”
- Get the chance
When you get the chance to do something, you have an opportunity to do it. This makes it particularly useful when talking about experiences, travel, work and things you’d like to do. You might say, “I didn’t get the chance to talk to her yesterday,” “I finally got the chance to visit London,” or “If you get the chance, visit the old town.”
The pattern is get the chance to + verb. You’ll also frequently hear have the chance to, particularly in sentences such as “I haven’t had the chance to watch that film yet.” Notice the entire pattern rather than only the word chance. That gives you a structure you can immediately reuse with visit, try, speak, see, meet, travel and hundreds of other verbs.
- Make sure
Finally, make sure is one of those combinations you’ll hear constantly in everyday English. We use it when we want to be certain that something happens or that something is correct. For example, “Make sure you lock the door,” “Make sure you bring your passport,” or “I just want to make sure I understood you correctly.”
A useful pattern is make sure + subject + verb: Make sure you call me when you arrive. Make sure you save your work. Make sure you have enough time. Once you start listening for this expression in conversations, films and videos, you’ll probably notice just how frequently it appears.
How should you actually learn collocations?
This is where the way you practise becomes important. Reading a list of collocations and understanding all of them doesn’t automatically mean that you’ll be able to retrieve them during a conversation. If speaking is your goal, you need to give yourself opportunities to produce the collocations rather than only recognise them.
Suppose you’re learning make an effort. You could repeat make an effort, make an effort, make an effort, but that doesn’t give the expression much context. Instead, connect it to your own life: I’m making an effort to exercise three times a week. I’m making an effort to speak more English. I’m making an effort to use my phone less in the evening. Now the collocation is connected to situations, meanings and experiences that are personally relevant to you.
Then say your sentences out loud. This final step matters if your objective is speaking. You’re practising retrieving and producing the combination rather than simply recognising it on a page.
Go one step further when you learn a new word
Whenever you learn a new English word, start by asking “What does this word mean?” Then go one step further and ask “What words does it normally go with?”
If you’re learning the word effort, for example, notice make an effort, put effort into something and a lot of effort. If you’re learning decision, notice make a decision, an important decision, a difficult decision and the right decision. You’re still learning the individual word, but you’re also learning the linguistic environment in which that word naturally appears.
Over time, this changes the way you build your vocabulary. Instead of collecting hundreds of isolated words and then trying to work out how to combine them while you’re speaking, you gradually build a bank of ready-to-use pieces of English.
Try this simple collocation challenge
Choose just three collocations from this article and create one true sentence about yourself with each one. For example: I’m making an effort to exercise more. I need to take the cost into account before I make a decision. I want to make the most of my free time this weekend.
Then put the article away and say the three sentences aloud without reading them. Later, try using the same collocations again in slightly different sentences. You don’t need to learn all ten at once. The objective is to make a small number of useful combinations easier to retrieve when you actually need them.
That’s the shift we’re looking for: moving vocabulary from something you recognise to language you can actually use.
Free collocation worksheets
If you’d like to practise further, I’ve created two free worksheets to accompany this lesson. The first focuses specifically on the 10 everyday collocations in this article, with activities that help you notice the patterns, create personal examples and practise using the expressions in speaking.
The second is a B2 Real-Life Collocation Bank, containing a larger selection of useful collocations organised around everyday topics such as work, relationships, travel, money, health, plans and daily life. You can use it as an ongoing reference: choose the combinations that are most relevant to you, create your own examples and gradually introduce them into your spoken English.
From knowing words to using English
Expanding your vocabulary is important, but progress doesn’t always mean replacing simple words with increasingly sophisticated alternatives. Often, a significant improvement comes from learning how familiar words naturally work together.
Learn what a word means, notice which words it commonly combines with, connect those combinations to your own life, and then practise using them aloud. In this way, vocabulary becomes more than a collection of words you understand when you see them. It starts becoming language you can actually use in real-life conversations.
