monopoly
/məˈnɒpəli//məˈnɑpəli/
monopoly noun: a situation, by legal privilege or other agreement, in which solely one party (company, cartel etc.) exclusively provides a particular product or service, dominating that market and generally exerting powerful control over it.
Noun
monopoly (plural monopolies)
- A situation, by legal privilege or other agreement, in which solely one party (company, cartel etc.) exclusively provides a particular product or service, dominating that market and generally exerting powerful control over it.
- The sale of the leaves and roots was a Government monopoly, and from it the Kings of Kôr derived a large proportion of their private revenue.1886 October – 1887 January, H[enry] Rider Haggard, She: A History of Adventure, London: Longmans, Green, and Co., published 1887, →OCLC
- In 1918 a Chinese company was given a monopoly to run a service between Victoria and the districts of Mong Kok and Sham Shui Po. Five years later this monopoly was transferred to the Hong Kong and Yaumati Ferry Company, together with the right to run a service to Yau Ma Tei.1962, G. B. Endacott, A. Hinton, “Public Works and Transport”, in Fragrant Harbour: A Short History of Hong Kong, Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, published 1977, →ISBN, →LCCN, →OCLC, page 122
- An exclusive control over the trade or production of a commodity or service through exclusive possession.
- A land monopoly renders its holder(s) nearly almighty in an agricultural society.
- Монополисти́ческое облада́ние важне́йшими исто́чниками сыры́х материа́лов стра́шно увели́чило власть кру́пного капита́ла и обостри́ло противоре́чие ме́жду картелли́рованной и некартелли́рованной промы́шленностью.1917 [1916], Владимир Ленин [Vladimir Lenin], Империализм, как высшая стадия капитализма (В. И. Ленин: Полное собрание сочинений; 27), published 1969, page 421; English translation from Yuri...
- The privilege granting the exclusive right to exert such control.
- Granting monopolies in concession constitutes a market-conform alternative to taxation for the state, while the crown sometimes bestowed a monopoly as an outrageous gift.
- The market thus controlled.
- The holder (person, company or other) of such market domination in one of the above manners.
- Synonyms:
- monopolist
Proper noun capitalized: Monopoly
Monopoly
- A board game in which players use play money to buy and trade properties, with the objective of forcing opponents into bankruptcy.
- I was playing Monopoly with my friends at 12:00am last night.
- In America, where classics like Monopoly dominate, Eurogames still have an avidly geeky following.2008 August 28, “German recreation: An affinity for rules?”, in The Economist, archived from the original on 02 Feb 2021
monopoly meaning in Hindi, Tamil, Marathi and Urdu
monopoly in Hindi
- situation of exclusive supply
- एकाधिकार ekādhikār, एकाधिपत्य ekādhipatya
monopoly in Tamil
- ஏகபோகம், ஒருவரலடைவு, தனிஉரிமம், தனியுரிமை, முழுநிறை அதிகாரம், முற்றொருமை
monopoly in Marathi
- Monopoly
- व्यापार vyāpār
monopoly in Urdu
- situation of exclusive supply
- اِجارَہ داری ijāra dārī
More languagesFewer languages
- monopoly in Bengali
- একাধিকার ekadhikar, একাধিপত্য ekadhipotto
- monopoly in Telugu
- గుత్తాధిపత్యం, ఏకస్వామ్యము
- monopoly in Malayalam
- കുത്തക, കുത്തകാവകാശം, ഏകാവകാശം
- monopoly in Kannada
- ಏಕಸ್ವಾಮ್ಯ, ಏಕಸ್ವಾಮ್ಯತೆ, ಪೂರ್ಣಾಧಿಕಾರ, ಸಂಪೂರ್ಣ ಹಕ್ಕು
- monopoly in Punjabi
- ਇਜਾਰਾ ijārā
- monopoly in Gujarati
- ઇજારો ijāro
- monopoly in Odia
- ଏକାଧିକାର
- monopoly in Sanskrit
- एकाधिकार ekādhikāra
- monopoly in Nepali
- एकाधिकार, एक एकाधिकार, एकस्वाम्य
- monopoly in Pashto
- انحصار enhesār
- monopoly in Tagalog
- sarilakal, saritangi, monopolyo
- monopoly in Arabic
- اِحْتِكَار iḥtikār, اِنْحِصَار inḥiṣār
- monopoly in Malay
- monopoli
- monopoly in Indonesian
- monopoli
- monopoly in Thai
- การผูกขาด gaan-pùuk-kàat
- monopoly in Vietnamese
- sự độc quyền
Examples of monopoly in a sentence
- It has jailed environmental activists and is planning to limit the power of judicial oversight by handing a state-approved body a monopoly over bringing environmental lawsuits.2013 August 10, “Can China clean up fast enough?”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8848, archived from the original on 12 Feb 2014:
- You could not be describing a monopoly more clearly if you were wearing a metal top hat while driving a metal car after winning second prize in a beauty contest!2014 June 1, “Net Neutrality”, in Last Week Tonight with John Oliver, season 1, episode 5, John Oliver (actor), via HBO:
- On building companies, [Sam] Altman frequently channeled [Peter] Thiel’s “monopoly” strategy, the belief that all founders should “aim for monopoly” to create a successful business.2025, Karen Hao, Empire of AI, New York City: Penguin Press, →ISBN:
- My great grandfather had the monopoly of eggs in all of China and my grandmother was super rich living in a mansion when the cultural revolution happened and communism took everything away.2020 January 31, Kay Tye, Twitter (tweet), archived from the original on 01 Feb 2020, deleted:
Synonyms of monopoly
Antonyms
Forms of monopoly
| plural | monopolies |
|---|
Origin of monopoly
From Latin monopōlium, from Ancient Greek μονοπώλιον (monopṓlion, “a right of exclusive sale”), from μόνος (mónos, “sole”) + πωλέω (pōléō, “to barter, sell”). By surface analysis, mono- + -poly.
See monopoly.
Words formed from monopoly
Words that rhyme with monopoly
Questions about monopoly
- What does monopoly mean?
- Monopoly means a situation, by legal privilege or other agreement, in which solely one party (company, cartel etc.) exclusively provides a particular product or service, dominating that market and generally exerting powerful control over it.
- What is monopoly in Hindi?
- Monopoly in Hindi is एकाधिकार (ekādhikār), एकाधिपत्य (ekādhipatya). See Monopoly meaning in Hindi.
- How do you use monopoly in a sentence?
- It has jailed environmental activists and is planning to limit the power of judicial oversight by handing a state-approved body a monopoly over bringing environmental lawsuits.
- What part of speech is monopoly?
- Monopoly can be a noun or a proper noun.
- How do you pronounce monopoly?
- Monopoly is pronounced /məˈnɒpəli/ (UK).
- What is the plural of monopoly?
- The plural of monopoly is monopolies.
Words near monopoly in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: monopoly (page history and authors); Monopoly (page history and authors); monopoly (Tamil Wiktionary) (page history and authors); व्यापार (Marathi) (page history and authors); monopoly (Telugu, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); monopoly (Malayalam Wiktionary) (page history and authors); monopoly (Kannada Wiktionary) (page history and authors); ਇਜਾਰਾ (Punjabi) (page history and authors); monopoly (Odia, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license); monopoly (Nepali, IndicTrans2 machine translation) (model and license). 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-us-monopoly.ogg, LL-Q1860 (eng)-Vealhurl-Monopoly.wav.
Cite this entry: “monopoly.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/monopoly. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.