adj ·Uncommon ·Advanced level

Definitions

Adjective

1. 1
   Of high cost; expensive.

   "a costly activity"

Adjective

1. 1
   having a high price wordnet
2. 2
   entailing great loss or sacrifice wordnet

Synonyms

All synonyms

highdeardeardearly wondearly-wonexpensive

Antonyms

All antonyms

freeaffordablearidcheap

Example

More examples

"The broccoli is either costly or of poor quality."

Etymology

From Middle English costly, costely, costeley, equivalent to cost + -ly.

Related phrases

costly colours

Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.