cost

verb

1. 1

   To incur a charge of; to require payment of a (specified) price.

   This shirt cost $50, while this was cheaper at only $30.

   It will cost you a lot of money to take a trip around the world.

   Thus the red damask curtains which now shut out the fog-laden, drizzling atmosphere of the Marylebone Road, had cost a mere song, and yet they might have been warranted to last another thirty years. A great bargain also had been the excellent Axminster carpet which covered the floor;[…].

2. 2

   To cause something to be lost; to cause the expenditure or relinquishment of.

   Trying to rescue the man from the burning building cost them their lives.

   the packaging of home-delivered products now accounts for 30% of the solid rubbish the US generates annually, and the cardboard alone costs 1bn trees.

   though it cost me ten nights' watchings

3. 3

   To require to be borne or suffered; to cause.

   to do him wanton rites, which cost them woe

   LUKE: "That little droid is going to cost me a lot of trouble."

4. 4

   To calculate or estimate a price.

   I'd cost the repair work at a few thousand.

5. 5

   To cost (a person) a great deal of money or suffering.

   I can give you the names, but it'll cost you.

   That's going to cost you!

noun

1. 1

   Amount of money, time, etc. that is required or used.

   The total cost of the new complex was an estimated $1.5 million.

   We have to cut costs if we want to avoid bankruptcy.

   The average cost of a new house is twice as much as it was 20 years ago.

   According to this saga of intellectual-property misanthropy, these creatures [patent trolls] roam the business world, buying up patents and then using them to demand extravagant payouts from companies they accuse of infringing them. Often, their victims pay up rather than face the costs of a legal battle.

2. 2

   A negative consequence or loss that occurs or is required to occur.

   Spending all your time working may earn you a lot of money at the cost of your health.

   The army won the battle decisively, but at a cost of many lives.

   We simply do not have the option to return to a lower economic level, at least not a rational option. Peer polity competition drives increased complexity and resource consumption regardless of costs, human or ecological.

noun

1. 1

   obsoleteManner; way; means; available course; contrivance.

2. 2

   Quality; condition; property; value; worth; a wont or habit; disposition; nature; kind; characteristic.

noun

1. 1

   obsoleteA rib; a side.

   betwixt the costs of a ship

2. 2

   A cottise.

Forms

plural

costs

past tense

costed

past participle

costed

present participle

costing

third person singular

costs