Word.ws English Dictionary

bottom line

bottom line noun: the final balance; the amount of money or profit left after everything has been tallied.

Noun

bottom line (countable and uncountable, plural bottom lines)

  1. The final balance; the amount of money or profit left after everything has been tallied.
    • For quotations using this term, see Citations:bottom line.
  2. (idiomatic) The summary or result; the most important information.
    • The bottom line is that there simply are not enough hours in the day to finish all there is to do.
    • I need your lovin' and that's the bottom line / I need your lovin' or just a little time1980, Teena Marie, “I Need Your Lovin’”, in Irons in the Fire
    Synonyms:
    upshot, net-net
  3. (idiomatic) A minimum acceptable result from a negotiation.
    • My bottom line for this job is $125,000; any less and I'll walk away.

Adverb

bottom line (not comparable)

  1. (sentence adverb) Synonym of all in all.
    • Bottom line, there's no way we're coming to the family reunion, as we can't afford hotel stays and airfares right now.
    Synonyms:
    all in all

bottom line meaning in Tamil, Bengali and Arabic

bottom line in Tamil

அடிப்படைச் செய்தி, முக்கியமான புரிதல், அடித்தளக்கோடு, அடித்தளக் கோடு

bottom line in Bengali

বটম লাইন

bottom line in Arabic

summary or result
حاصل الأمر

Examples of bottom line in a sentence

  • When Gorbachev totals up the balance sheet of Soviet strengths and weaknesses, the bottom line is not encouraging.1988, Richard Nixon, “The Superpowers”, in 1999: Victory Without War, Simon and Schuster, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 38:
  • But the bottom line is that passengers want to see staff at a station and be able to find them easily.2023 July 26, Stefanie Foster, “Rebuild trust or it's game over”, in RAIL, number 988, page 3:

Synonyms of bottom line

Forms of bottom line

pluralbottom lines

Origin of bottom line

A reference to the literal bottom line of an income statement or other accounting record.

Words formed from bottom line

Questions about bottom line

What does bottom line mean?
Bottom line means the final balance; the amount of money or profit left after everything has been tallied.
What is bottom line in Tamil?
Bottom line in Tamil is அடிப்படைச் செய்தி, முக்கியமான புரிதல், அடித்தளக்கோடு. See Bottom line meaning in Tamil.
How do you use bottom line in a sentence?
When Gorbachev totals up the balance sheet of Soviet strengths and weaknesses, the bottom line is not encouraging.
What part of speech is bottom line?
Bottom line can be a noun or an adverb.
What is the plural of bottom line?
The plural of bottom line is bottom lines.

Words near bottom line in the dictionary

  1. bottom hands
  2. bottom heat
  3. bottom hopping
  4. bottom kill
  5. bottom kills
  6. bottom line
  7. bottom liner
  8. bottom liners
  9. bottom lines
  10. bottom liver
  11. bottom livers

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: bottom line (page history and authors); bottom line (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); bottom line (Bengali Wiktionary) (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

Last updated:

Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: en-au-bottom line.ogg.

Cite this entry: “bottom line.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/bottom_line. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.