break-even

or break·e·ven

[ breyk-ee-vuhn ]

/ ˈbreɪkˈi vən /

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adjective

having income exactly equal to expenditure, thus showing neither profit nor loss.

noun

break-even point.

Energy. the stage at which a fission or fusion reaction becomes self-sustaining.

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Origin of break-even

An Americanism dating back to 1935–40

Words nearby break-even

breakdown voltage, breaker, breaker card, breakerless ignition, breaker zone, break-even, breakeven chart, break-even point, breakfast, breakfast club, breakfast food

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2021

How to use break-even in a sentence

Alcohol and sugar, even in moderate amounts, are not only sinful but poisonous.
How Taryn Toomey’s ‘The Class’ Became New York’s Latest Fitness Craze|Lizzie Crocker|January 9, 2015|DAILY BEAST
This is even more striking in Submission than in his previous books.
Houellebecq’s Incendiary Novel Imagines France With a Muslim President|Pierre Assouline|January 9, 2015|DAILY BEAST
Even internally in the House, women are not getting their fair shake.
The Unbearable Whiteness of Congress|Dean Obeidallah|January 8, 2015|DAILY BEAST
Weiss is likely to get confirmed even as Warren and a handful of other progressive Democrats vote no.
Sen. Warren’s Main Street Crusade to Pressure Clinton|Eleanor Clift|January 8, 2015|DAILY BEAST

For many years afterward it was a never-ending topic of conversation, and is more or less talked of even to this day.
New York’s Most Tragic Ghost Loves Minimalist Swedish Fashion|Nina Strochlic|January 8, 2015|DAILY BEAST
Some were even re-arrested for the same nefarious purpose, and the daily papers published their names on each occasion.
The Philippine Islands|John Foreman
Even as they gazed they saw its roof caught up, and whirled off as if it had been a scroll of paper.
The Giant of the North|R.M. Ballantyne
I presume the twenty-five or thirty miles at this end is unhealthy, even for natives, but it surely need not be so.
Glances at Europe|Horace Greeley
Genoa has but recently and partially felt the new impulse, yet even here the march of improvement is visible.
Glances at Europe|Horace Greeley
He was the strangest-looking creature Davy had ever seen, not even excepting the Goblin.
Davy and The Goblin|Charles E. Carryl

British Dictionary definitions for break-even

break even

verb

(intr, adverb) to attain a level of activity, as in commerce, or a point of operation, as in gambling, at which there is neither profit nor loss

noun breakeven

accounting

the level of commercial activity at which the total cost and total revenue of a business enterprise are equal
(as modifier)breakeven prices

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Other Idioms and Phrases with break-even

break even

Neither gain nor lose in some venture, recoup the amount one invested. For example, If the dealer sells five cars a week, he'll break even. This expression probably came from one or another card game (some authorities say it was faro), where it meant to bet that a card would win and lose an equal number of times. It soon was transferred to balancing business gains and losses. Novelist Sinclair Lewis so used it in Our Mr. Wrenn (1914). The usage gave rise to the noun break-even point, for the amount of sales or production needed for a firm to recoup its investment. [Late 1800s]