liberal in bestowing gifts, favors, or bounties; munificent; generous.
abundant; ample.
a bountiful supply.
plentiful; ample (esp in the phrase a bountiful supply )
giving freely; generous
What does bountiful mean? Bountiful describes something abundant or plentiful. For example, if you have so many pens that you think you’ll never run out of them, you could say you have a bountiful supply of pens. Bountiful also means generous, especially in giving gifts or favors. For example, you could say that a new job is bountiful because it pays a lot of money or has a lot of benefits, like its own coffee bar with a barista, hammocks, and a skateboard park. Example: The city had a bountiful supply of interesting museums to visit.
Bountiful means abundant or given generously. We celebrate the idea of a bountiful harvest with a Thanksgiving cornucopia overflowing with its bounty of pumpkins, apples, squashes, and cranberries. Bountiful can also mean generously given, with the idea that the original bounty of a harvest came from the gods you prayed to for rain and sun. When you received their gifts, you thanked them for their generosity. Now, bountiful giving is something you might experience with your parents or grandparents, happy just to see you smile on your birthday.
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Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
The paddle craze of the decade has bountiful benefits for people living with the neurodegenerative disease.
From The Wall Street Journal • May 2, 2026
Upon closer inspection, though, the clues were visible: the group’s relaxed pace, the bountiful tote bags, the occasional flash of a paperback.
From Los Angeles Times • Apr. 16, 2026
Even when crops are bountiful in the U.S., consumers are not immune to global economic forces.
From Salon • Apr. 8, 2026
"But so much attention to female fandom... risks overshadowing what a bountiful gift Heated Rivalry is to the gays," wrote David Rooney in the Hollywood Reporter.
From BBC • Jan. 7, 2026
And he told the Pilgrims to fertilize the soil by burying fish alongside the maize seeds, a traditional native technique for producing a bountiful harvest.
From "1491" by Charles C. Mann
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
