From Longman Dictionary of Contemporary Englishshut down phrasal verb1 STOP HAPPENINGif a company, factory, large machine etc shuts down or is shut down, it stops operating, either permanently or for a short time Our local hardware shop has shut down.shut something ↔ down an accident which resulted in two of the plant’s nuclear reactors being shut down The way to shut the machine down is to type EXIT.2 shut somebody ↔ down informalDS to prevent an opposing team or player from playing well or getting points We all knew that to win we’d have to shut down Bobby Mitchell. → shut→ See Verb table
Examples from the Corpus
shut down• I'm always forgetting to shut down my computer before I go home. 