eBay
AmericanEtymology
Origin of eBay
First recorded in 1990–95; short for Echo Bay Technology Group, a company founded by the founder of eBay, Pierre Omidyar (born 1967), French-born American entrepreneur of Iranian ancestry
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
Urchins usually retail somewhere between $15 and $20, but the coveted original version—the “Coike,” created by the Japanese company Hideup, and distributed in the U.S. by Spro Sports Professionals—can fetch hundreds on eBay.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 12, 2026
Depop, eBay as well as Vinted have previously said they would suspend or ban users if they were caught selling counterfeit goods.
From BBC ● Aug. 11, 2026
Some analysts doubt whether eBay would benefit much from that sort of deal.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Aug. 10, 2026
Analysts have questioned how the deal would work, given that GameStop, with a market cap of around $8.6 billion, is much smaller than eBay, which Wall Street believes is worth nearly $50 billion.
From MarketWatch ● Aug. 10, 2026
In fact, it was so good that eBay bought PayPal, but not on the recommendation of its Wall Street investment bankers— on the recommendation of its users.
From "The World Is Flat" by Thomas L. Friedman
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.
