Word.ws English Dictionary

lay odds

lay odds verb: to offer a bet in which one stands more to lose than the opponent; or a bet in some other way favourable to the opponent.

Verb

lay odds (third-person singular simple present lays odds, present participle laying odds, simple past and past participle laid odds)

  1. To offer a bet in which one stands more to lose than the opponent; or a bet in some other way favourable to the opponent.
    • Prince John: "I will lay odds that, ere this year expire, / We bear our civil swords and native fire / As far as France. I heard a bird so sing, / Whose music, to my thinking, pleas'd the King."c. 1596–1599 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Second Part of Henry the Fourth, […]. Epilogue.”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […]...
    • "We're dead safe," he assured them with a laugh. "No salt mines this time, Smoke. But I'll tell you what -- I'll lay odds of five to one it's the Macedonia."1904, Jack London, chapter 24, in The Sea-Wolf (Macmillan’s Standard Library), New York, N.Y.: Grosset & Dunlap, →OCLC
  2. To feel certain about something.

Synonyms of lay odds

  • give odds

Antonyms

  • take odds

Forms of lay odds

third-person singular presentlays odds
present participlelaying odds
past participlelaid odds
pastlaid odds

Questions about lay odds

What does lay odds mean?
Lay odds means to offer a bet in which one stands more to lose than the opponent; or a bet in some other way favourable to the opponent.
What part of speech is lay odds?
Lay odds is a verb.
What is the past tense of lay odds?
The past tense of lay odds is laid odds.

Words near lay odds in the dictionary

  1. lay judge
  2. lay judges
  3. lay lord
  4. lay lords
  5. lay low
  6. lay odds
  7. lay of the land
  8. lay off
  9. lay on
  10. lay on the line
  11. lay on the oars

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: lay odds (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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Pronunciation audio from Wikimedia Commons, each file under its own free license: En-au-lay odds.ogg.

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