overspend
overspend verb: to spend too much money; especially, to spend more than one earns.
Verb
overspend (third-person singular simple present overspends, present participle overspending, simple past and past participle overspent)
- To spend too much money; especially, to spend more than one earns.
- To get out of debt, first keep a budget and be careful not to overspend.
- Antonyms:
- underspend
Noun
overspend (plural overspends)
- The amount by which someone or something is overspent.
- Whether an underspend or overspend is significant depends upon the size of the budget. A £1,000 overspend on an £8,000 drugs budget is very significant, but a £1,000 overspend may not be significant on a £300,000 ward budget.2018, David Bailey, The NHS Budget Holder's Survival Guide, CRC Press, →ISBN
- Electrification was not included in anticipated CP6 spending, after cost uncertainties following the Great Western Main Line overspend led to cutbacks by the Department of Transport to contain costs.2021 October 20, Industry Insider, “The wheels turn slowly”, in RAIL, number 942, page 68
- Antonyms:
- underspend
Examples of overspend in a sentence
- They frequently overspent and soon ran into debt.
- I look poorly on any suggestion of overspending.
- Those who underearn should avoid overspending.
Antonyms of overspend
Forms of overspend
| Verb | |
|---|---|
| third-person singular present | overspends |
| present participle | overspending |
| past participle | overspent |
| past | overspent |
| Noun | |
| plural | overspends |
Origin of overspend
From over- + spend.
Words formed from overspend
Words that rhyme with overspend
48 more rhymesFewer rhymes
- spend
- suspend
- trend
- ascend
- offend
- pretend
- unbend
- commend
- tend
- amend
- contend
- depend
- lend
- distend
- impend
- recommend
- rend
- shend
- subtend
- tight end
- upend
- wend
- append
- befriend
- blend
- pend
- resend
- transcend
- abend
- comprehend
- entend
- fend
- obtend
- perpend
- portend
- unfriend
- vend
- weekend
- when'd
- blende
- defriend
- disrecommend
- emend
- expend
- forfend
- forspend
- freakend
- genetic dead end
Questions about overspend
- What does overspend mean?
- Overspend means to spend too much money; especially, to spend more than one earns.
- What part of speech is overspend?
- Overspend can be a verb or a noun.
- What is the past tense of overspend?
- The past tense of overspend is overspent.
Words near overspend in the dictionary
Source and license
Adapted from Wiktionary: overspend (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: LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-overspend.wav.
Cite this entry: “overspend.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/overspend. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.