greenlight

• green-light

From green light.

• IPA^(key): /ˈɡɹiːnlaɪt/

• Audio (US):

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greenlight (third-person singular simple present greenlights, present participle greenlighting, simple past and past participle greenlighted or greenlit)

1. (transitive, idiomatic, informal) To approve; to permit to proceed.
   • 2020 December 2, Paul Stephen, “Network News: Sunak focuses on jobs, infrastructure and 'levelling up'”, in Rail, page 7:

     Labour's Shadow Chancellor Anneliese Dodds hit back at Sunak and said that his failure to greenlight major projects such as Northern Powerhouse Rail showed that government claims of levelling up the country were "not supported by the evidence".

   • 2024 August 11, Riley Bailey, Christina Harward, Angelica Evans, Grace Mappes, Davit Gasparyan, Frederick W. Kagan, “Russian Offensive Campaign Assessment, August 17, 2024”, in Ukraine Project, The Institute for the Study of War:

     The United Kingdom (UK) is reportedly waiting for US approval before greenlighting Ukrainian forces to use UK-provided Storm Shadow missiles for long-range strikes against military targets in Russia.

2. (transitive, slang, idiomatic) To approve or requisition the harming or death of; to put a hit out on.

• The past participle greenlit is now more common than greenlighted.^[1]

• (approve): allow, approve, give the go-ahead, give the green light, permit, rubber stamp, wave through

• redlight

• Stan Carey on "greenlit" (2023-08-16) at Language Log