count on

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count on (third-person singular simple present counts on, present participle counting on, simple past and past participle counted on)

1. (transitive) To rely on, trust, or expect.

   Don't count on being able to get back into the building after 5pm.

   Can we count on you to help out?

   • 1849–1861, Thomas Babington Macaulay, chapter VIII, in The History of England from the Accession of James the Second, volume (please specify |volume=I to V), London: Longman, Brown, Green, and Longmans, →OCLC:

     He was brewer to the palace; and it was apprehended that the government counted on his voice.

   • 1999, Chuck Palahniuk, Survivor:

     The first time you meet that someone special, you can count on them one day being dead and in the ground.

   • 2001, Builder's Guide to Accounting:

     Or perhaps something unusual occurred in the current period that you can't count on to repeat itself.

   • 2009, “Going green: Young talent cuts costs, builds continuity”, in USA Today:

     "Hopefully you can count on them for a long period of time. Quite frankly, not often do you give those players up."

   • 2022 June 23, Francine Hirsch, “Russia is counting on the media to spread propaganda about show trials”, in The Washington Post‎, retrieved 14 December 2022:

     The trial will be targeted at Russians as well as an international audience — and the organizers will be counting on extensive coverage in the world press.

• This is an inseparable phrasal verb, i.e. on functions as a preposition, not as an adverb.

• bank on
• hang one's hat on
• count in
• reckon on

• no-count