allowance
Americannoun
-
allowances
plural
-
the act of allowing.
-
an amount or share allotted or granted.
- Synonyms:
- allotment
-
a sum of money allotted or granted for a particular purpose, as for expenses.
Her allowance for the business trip was $200.
-
a sum of money allotted or granted to a person on a regular basis, as for personal or general living expenses.
The art student lived on an allowance of $600 a month.
When I was in first grade, my parents gave me an allowance of seven dollars a week.
- Synonyms:
- stipend
-
an addition or deduction based on an extenuating or qualifying circumstance.
an allowance for profit;
an allowance for depreciation.
-
acknowledgment; concession.
the allowance of a claim.
-
passive permission resulting from lack of interference; toleration.
the allowance of slavery.
- Synonyms:
- sufferance, permission, acceptance
- Antonyms:
- proscription, prohibition, interdiction
-
Machinery. a prescribed difference in dimensions of two closely fitting mating parts with regard to minimum clearance or maximum interference.
-
Coining. tolerance.
verb (used with object)
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to place on a fixed allowance, as of food or drink.
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to allocate (supplies, rations, etc.) in fixed or regular amounts.
idioms
noun
-
an amount of something, esp money or food, given or allotted usually at regular intervals
-
a discount, as in consideration for something given in part exchange or to increase business; rebate
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(in Britain) an amount of a person's income that is not subject to a particular tax and is therefore deducted before his or her liability to taxation is assessed
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a portion set aside to compensate for something or to cover special expenses
-
education a salary supplement given to a teacher who is appointed to undertake extra duties and responsibilities
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admission; concession
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the act of allowing; sanction; toleration
-
something allowed
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(usually foll by for)
-
to take mitigating circumstances into account in consideration (of)
-
to allow (for)
-
verb
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of allowance
1350–1400; Middle English alouance < Middle French. See allow, -ance
Explanation
When you're a kid, you might earn an allowance or a sum of money in exchange for doing chores around the house. Your parents' allowance — or tolerance — of your silly behavior will depend on how strict they are. An allowance is a quantity of something that's allowed or permitted within a set of rules or for a particular purpose. This could be a weekly allowance you earn as a kid, or it could be the allowance for passengers on a flight to have two carry-on items. To make allowances for someone means to treat someone leniently, or to give them a break.
Vocabulary lists containing allowance
Christopher Columbus' Diary: The First Voyage
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"Principles of Business," Vocabulary from Chapter 16
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Shiloh
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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.
See Examples For:
Customers who get PIP and are classed as having limited mobility can lease a car for no cash upfront—they simply forgo about £320 a month of “enhanced mobility” allowance.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 12, 2026
“While much remains to be seen, its clearest differentiator is its industry-leading output allowance of 1 million tokens,” Evercore ISI analyst Mark Mahaney wrote in a note to clients.
From MarketWatch ● Sep. 30, 2026
Charlene remembered her nephew as a source of happiness in her home, a cheerful presence who once used his allowance to buy his mother a stuffed unicorn.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 18, 2026
Eastman says the "cost of living" and the "disparity" between the local housing allowance and rents, which in Harlow are "really expensive".
From BBC ● Sep. 13, 2026
Aru didn’t have any experience with dads, but she was pretty sure giving your kid a glowing Ping-Pong ball to fight demons was like getting pocket fuzz and spare change instead of an allowance.
From "Aru Shah and the End of Time" by Roshani Chokshi
"But what we are actually lacking the most right now is pilots. Of course, I hope the government can provide better additional allowances for these military pilots."
From Barron's ● Oct. 2, 2026
The pay packages also typically include car allowances and bonus opportunities, she said.
From MarketWatch ● Oct. 2, 2026
B&Q said the underpayments were unintentional and the result of calculations involving geographical allowances, while Five Guys blamed "technical differences in how payroll regulations were applied".
From BBC ● Sep. 2, 2026
It is fed by California’s cap-and-invest program, which allows large polluters to buy and sell allowances for their greenhouse gas emissions.
From Los Angeles Times ● Aug. 26, 2026
“My mum said we need to make allowances for you,” Lily finally said.
From "A Monster Calls" by Patrick Ness
The first album I ever bought with my own money, allowanced saved up for weeks, was “Long Hard Climb.”
From Los Angeles Times ● Oct. 1, 2020
Then don't you ever go and say you were allowanced, mind that.'
From The Old Curiosity Shop by Charles Dickens
I also cut about three or four pounds off a flitch of bacon that hung in the chimney corner, nicely marked to prevent any being lost on account of my late allowanced state.
From The Autobiography of Sergeant William Lawrence A Hero of the Peninsular and Waterloo Campaigns by George Nugent-Bankes
But the timber will be allowanced, and the land parcelled out, to each household according to its needs, as soon as either becomes scarce, as is already the case in Russia.
From The Conquest of Bread by Petr Alekseevich Kropotkin, Prince
Further, I was told that tea, coffee, and sugar are roughly allowanced to each family.
From The Communistic Societies of the United States From Personal Visit and Observation by Charles Nordhoff
The Germans had been allowancing Recicourt to nine a day.
From The Martial Adventures of Henry and Me by William Allen White
And when the larger wood begins to grow scarce, what course does the peasant adopt?—The allowancing of individuals.
From The Place of Anarchism in Socialistic Evolution An Address Delivered in Paris by Henry Glasse
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.
