improved

1. 1
   verb

   Simple past and past participle of improve.

   Sales improved steadily over the final quarter of the year.

   The neighborhood has improved considerably since the new park opened.

   Note

   Because improve works both with and without an object, this form leads two lives. With an object it builds passives: the road was improved by the council. Without one it gives plain past and perfect tenses: sales improved, the neighborhood has improved. Older texts can catch readers out, since improve once also meant to refute or to censure, so an argument improved there may be one disproved.

2. 2
   adjective

   Made better in quality, function, or condition than before; enhanced.

   The clinic reported improved outcomes after adopting the new treatment protocol.

   Drivers welcomed the improved road surface on the mountain pass.

   Similarbetter, enhanced, upgraded, superior, refined

   Oppositeworse, deteriorated

   Note

   A participle that has settled into an adjective, and it takes degrees like one: more improved, most improved. Intensifiers sit naturally in front of it, as in further improved in technical prose and much-improved in news writing. The compound is hyphenated before a noun, as in a much-improved railway. With no agent or object attached, it describes a resulting state rather than the act of improving.

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