noun
- the price paid to acquire, produce, accomplish, or maintain anything: the high cost of a good meal.
- an outlay or expenditure of money, time, labor, trouble, etc.: What will the cost be to me?
- a sacrifice, loss, or penalty: to work at the cost of one’s health.
- costs, Law.
- money allowed to a successful party in a lawsuit in compensation for legal expenses incurred, chargeable to the unsuccessful party.
- money due to a court or one of its officers for services in a cause.
verb (used with object), cost or for 10, cost·ed; cost·ing.
- to require the payment of (money or something else of value) in an exchange: That camera cost $200.
- to result in or entail the loss of: Carelessness costs lives.
- to cause to lose or suffer: The accident cost her a broken leg.
- to entail (effort or inconvenience): Courtesy costs little.
- to cause to pay or sacrifice: That request will cost us two weeks’ extra work.
- to estimate or determine the cost of (manufactured articles, new processes, etc.): We have costed the manufacture of each item.
verb (used without object), cost·ed or cost; cost·ing.
- to estimate or determine costs, as of manufacturing something.
Verb Phrases past and past participle cost·ed or cost; present participle cost·ing.
- cost out, to calculate the cost of (a project, product, etc.) in advance: The firm that hired him just costed out a major construction project last month.
- at all costs, regardless of the effort involved; by any means necessary: The stolen painting must be recovered at all costs.Also at any cost.
noun
- the price paid or required for acquiring, producing, or maintaining something, usually measured in money, time, or energy; expense or expenditure; outlay
- suffering or sacrifice; loss; penaltycount the cost to your health; I know to my cost
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- the amount paid for a commodity by its sellerto sell at cost
- (as modifier)the cost price
- (plural) law the expenses of judicial proceedings
- at any cost or at all costs regardless of cost or sacrifice involved
- at the cost of at the expense of losing
verb costs, costing or cost
- (tr) to be obtained or obtainable in exchange for (money or something equivalent); be priced atthe ride cost one pound
- to cause or require the expenditure, loss, or sacrifice (of)the accident cost him dearly
- to estimate the cost of (a product, process, etc) for the purposes of pricing, budgeting, control, etc
c.1200, from Old French cost (12c., Modern French coût) “cost, outlay, expenditure; hardship, trouble,” from Vulgar Latin *costare, from Latin constare, literally “to stand at” (or with), with a wide range of figurative senses including “to cost.” The idiom is the same one used in Modern English when someone says something “stands at X dollars” to mean it sells for X dollars. The Latin word is from com- “with” (see com-) + stare “to stand,” from PIE root *sta- “to stand” (see stet).
late 14c., from Old French coster (Modern French coûter) “to cost,” from cost (see cost (n.)).
see arm and a leg, cost an; at all costs; pretty penny, cost a.