Word.ws English Dictionary

pretty penny

Syllables: pret·ty pen·nyUK/ˌpɹɪti ˈpɛni/US/ˌpɹɪti ˈpɛni/

pretty penny noun: chiefly preceded by a: a considerable amount of money; a high income or price.

Noun

pretty penny (plural pretty pennies)

  1. (idiomatic, informal) Chiefly preceded by a: a considerable amount of money; a high income or price.
    • They could charge a pretty penny as they had a captive audience.
    • VVhy here may be a pretty Penny tovvards, if the Devil don't croſs it.1709 (date written), Susanna Cent-livre, The Man’s Bewitch’d; or, The Devil to Do about Her. A Comedy, […], Dublin: […] J. Jones, for George Ewing, […], published 1737, →OCLC, Act I, page 12

pretty penny meaning in Malayalam

pretty penny in Malayalam

വലിയ തുക

Examples of pretty penny in a sentence

  • We shall have our branch line—our shares are up, sir—and we buy your three fields along the Brawl, and put a pretty penny into your pocket, Mr.1848 November – 1850 December, William Makepeace Thackeray, “A Chapter of Match-making”, in The History of Pendennis. […], volume II...
  • [E]verything's as nice as can be all over the house, and that watered-silk she had on cost a pretty penny.1860, George Eliot [pseudonym; Mary Ann Evans], “Tom’s ‘First Half’”, in The Mill on the Floss […], volume I, Edinburgh; London: William...
  • "Then the Captain might still make a pretty penny on Amita," said the Scotchman.1885, Bret Harte, chapter I, in Maruja, Boston, Mass.; New York, N.Y.: Houghton, Mifflin and Company […], →OCLC, page 16:
  • He didn't know—he expected she was spending a pretty penny on dress.1906, John Galsworthy, “James at Large”, in The Man of Property, London: William Heinemann, →OCLC, part I, page 87:

Synonyms of pretty penny

Forms of pretty penny

pluralpretty pennies

Origin of pretty penny

From pretty (“(dated) moderately large, considerable”) + penny (“money in general”).

Words that rhyme with pretty penny

7 more rhymesFewer rhymes

Questions about pretty penny

What does pretty penny mean?
Pretty penny means chiefly preceded by a: a considerable amount of money; a high income or price.
What is pretty penny in Malayalam?
Pretty penny in Malayalam is വലിയ തുക. See Pretty penny meaning in Malayalam.
How do you use pretty penny in a sentence?
We shall have our branch line—our shares are up, sir—and we buy your three fields along the Brawl, and put a pretty penny into your pocket, Mr.
What part of speech is pretty penny?
Pretty penny is a noun.
How do you pronounce pretty penny?
Pretty penny is pronounced /ˌpɹɪti ˈpɛni/ (UK).
What is the plural of pretty penny?
The plural of pretty penny is pretty pennies.

Words near pretty penny in the dictionary

  1. pretty horsebreakers
  2. pretty much
  3. pretty pass
  4. pretty passes
  5. pretty pennies
  6. pretty penny
  7. pretty pictures
  8. Pretty Pine
  9. pretty please
  10. pretty please with a cherry on top
  11. pretty please with sugar on top

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: pretty penny (page history and authors); pretty penny (Malayalam Wiktionary) (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-au-pretty penny.ogg.

Cite this entry: “pretty penny.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/pretty_penny. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.