Meaning & use
price
Last updated
Meanings
nouncountable
The amount of money you must pay to buy something.
Grammar: Count noun: the price of bread, prices of houses.
Patterns
- the price of something
- at a price
The price of petrol rose again this month.
What is the price of this jacket?
We bought the sofa at a reduced price.
nounsingularfigurative
What must be given up or suffered to obtain or achieve something.
Grammar: Often singular with a: pay a heavy price.
Patterns
- the price of something
- pay the price for something
Fame came at a high price for her privacy.
Losing his friends was the price of his honesty.
Many workers paid the price for the poor planning.
verbtransitive
To decide or mark how much something will cost.
Grammar: Takes an object, often with adverbs: price the tickets low.
Patterns
- price something at something
The shop priced the bikes at two hundred dollars each.
They priced the house too high and it did not sell.
Airlines price seats differently depending on the date.
Word forms
| plural | prices |
|---|---|
| third person singular | prices |
| past tense | priced |
| past participle | priced |
| -ing form | pricing |
Common combinations
- price tag
- The price tag on the lamp said fifty dollars.
- rise in price
- Bread has gone up in price recently.
- fair price
- The seller asked a fair price.
- price range
- We looked at cars in a modest price range.
- price comparison
- A quick price comparison saved me twenty dollars.
- pay a price
- He paid a heavy price for ignoring the warnings.
Synonyms and how they differ
- cost
- Cost can mean the amount you spend as well as the effort or loss involved, while price is the amount the seller asks.
- fee
- A fee is paid for a service or entry, while price is paid for goods.
- charge
- Charge is the amount asked for a service or use, and often appears on bills.
- value
- Value is how much something is worth, which may differ from its price.
Opposites
Word family
- pricey adjective
- informal word for expensive
- priceless adjective
- too valuable to have a price
- pricing noun
- the way prices are set
- overprice verb
- to set a price too high
- price list noun
- a list of goods and prices
Commonly confused: price or prize? price or cost?
price vs prize
A prize is something won in a contest, while a price is what you pay.
price vs cost
Cost is what is spent or lost to get something; the price is what the seller asks.
Practice
Which word completes the sentence correctly? The ___ of tickets went up by ten percent.
Choose one answer.
Price is the amount you pay. Prize is an award, praise is approval, and prise means to force open.
Make it your own
Write a sentence using “price”, then check it and compare it with the examples above.