nickel and dime
/ˌnɪkəl ən ˈdaɪm/
nickel and dime adjective: small time; operating on a small scale; involving small amounts of money; petty or cheap.
Adjective
nickel and dime
- Small time; operating on a small scale; involving small amounts of money; petty or cheap.
- Near-synonyms: two-bit, ten-cent
- I bought my new ride from some nickel and dime used-car salesman.
Verb
nickel and dime (third-person singular simple present nickel and dimes or nickels and dimes, present participle nickel and diming or (US) nickeling and diming or (UK) nickelling and diming, simple past and past participle nickel and dimed or (US) nickeled and dimed or (UK) nickelled and dimed)
- To charge, or be charged, several unexpected small amounts of money, often in the form of fees, taxes, or related expenses to a venture, which when taken as a whole add up to a significant unexpected cost.
- I got nickel and dimed to death by the phone company's sneaky extra charges.
- It seems like a great offer, but they will just nickel and dime you until you've spent more than retail anyway.
- To wear down in small increments; to quibble or obsess endlessly with (someone) over trifles.
Noun (1)
nickel and dime
- Fifteen years.
Noun (2)
nickel and dime (plural nickel and dimes)
- A retail store selling inexpensive items, especially (originally, formerly) one in which all items had a price near a nickel (US five cents) or a dime (US ten cents).
- Near-synonym: dollar store (idiomatically synonymous in the 21st century)
- Synonyms:
- five and ten, five-and-dime, five and dime, dollar store
Synonyms of nickel and dime
Forms of nickel and dime
| Verb | |
|---|---|
| third-person singular present | nickel and dimes |
| third-person singular present | nickels and dimes |
| present participle | nickel and diming |
| present participle US | nickeling and diming |
| present participle UK | nickelling and diming |
| past participle | nickel and dimed |
| past | nickel and dimed |
| past participle US | nickeled and dimed |
| past US | nickeled and dimed |
| past participle UK | nickelled and dimed |
| past UK | nickelled and dimed |
| Noun | |
| plural | nickel and dimes |
Origin of nickel and dime
From the names of two US coins of small value.
From prison or criminal slang.
After retail stores where "everything costs a nickel or a dime".
Questions about nickel and dime
- What does nickel and dime mean?
- Nickel and dime means small time; operating on a small scale; involving small amounts of money; petty or cheap.
- What part of speech is nickel and dime?
- Nickel and dime can be an adjective, a verb or a noun.
- How do you pronounce nickel and dime?
- Nickel and dime is pronounced /ˌnɪkəl ən ˈdaɪm/ (US).
Words near nickel and dime in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: nickel and dime (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-us-nickel and dime.ogg, en-au-nickel and dime.ogg.
Cite this entry: “nickel and dime.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/nickel_and_dime. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.