Word.ws English Dictionary

by the dozen

by the dozen adverb: twelve at a time.

Adverb

by the dozen (not comparable)

  1. (literally) Twelve at a time.
    • Eggs are often sold by the dozen.
  2. (figuratively) In large numbers.
    • She's had boyfriends by the dozen.

Questions about by the dozen

What does by the dozen mean?
By the dozen means twelve at a time.
What part of speech is by the dozen?
By the dozen is an adverb.

Words near by the dozen in the dictionary

  1. by steam
  2. by the book
  3. by the by
  4. by the bye
  5. by the day
  6. by the dozen
  7. by the ears
  8. by the eye
  9. by the gods
  10. by the Grace of Allah
  11. by the Grace of God

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: by the dozen (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.

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Cite this entry: “by the dozen.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/by_the_dozen. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.