nCOLLOCATIONS – Meaning 2: two people who are married or having a sexual or romantic relationship
adjectives
a young/middle-aged/elderly couple
A young couple with a baby have just moved into the house next door.
a married couple
Under the new rules, a married couple will now receive £20 a week extra.
a newly married couple (=having married not long ago)
Many newly married couples cannot afford to buy their own homes.
an unmarried couple
She rented the room to a young, unmarried couple.
a childless couple (=without children)
Are childless couples more or less likely to split up?
a retired couple (=having finished working at the end of their working lives)
The house is suitable for a retired couple.
the happy couple (=the bride and bridegroom at their wedding)
Guests stood around the happy couple, their glasses raised.
a perfect couple (=a couple that seem very suitable for each other)
Emily and John seemed a perfect couple.
a courting couple old-fashioned (=having a romantic relationship, often planning to get married later)
The path by the river is a popular area for courting couples.
phrases
they make a lovely couple (=look very attractive together/suit each other well)
You two would make a lovely couple.
Examples from the Corpus
couple• And I've seen Fred a couple of times in the last few years.• It was a couple of hours before I could get back to Eleanor Darcy.• An elderlycouple live next door.• An elderly couple was sitting on the parkbench.• An entrepreneurial couple we talked to had always wanted to run a bed-and-breakfast.• Most bankruptciesinvolvecouples who jointly file a petition to have their debtswiped out.• Shirley and Bob are a young married couple with two small children.• The house was bought by a young married couple.• They're a nicecouple, aren't they?• By making breaking up harder to do, supportersbelieve that couples will focus more on staying together.• However, away from the cameras and microphones, the coupleargued continually.• The couple fell in love before they had even set eyes on each other during a six-month long distancecourtship.• the couple who live next door to me• He intends to invite some of these couples and topfertilityclinicexperts to appear before his panel.• It's increasingly common for unmarried couples to live together.• A young couple were walking hand in hand along the beach.
1[transitiveT]TTJOIN something TOGETHER to join or fasten two things together 〔把两件东西〕结合,连接
couple something to something
Each element is mathematically coupled to its neighbours.
每个元件都与相邻的元件精确地接合。
2.[intransitiveI] formalSYSEX/HAVE SEX WITH to have sex 交配,交媾
3couple something with somethingphrasal verbphr vWITHif one thing is coupled with another, the two things happen or exist together and produce a particular result 〔某物〕加上〔某物〕SYN combine
Lack of rain coupled with high temperatures caused the crops to fail.