miser

American  

[mahy-zer] / ˈmaɪ zər /

noun

• misers
  plural

1. a person who lives in wretched circumstances in order to save and hoard money.

2. a stingy, avaricious person.

   Synonyms:

   pinchpenny, tightwad, skinflint

3. Obsolete. a wretched or unhappy person.

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miser ¹ British  

/ ˈmaɪzə /

noun

1. a person who hoards money or possessions, often living miserably

2. selfish person

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miser ² British  

/ ˈmaɪzə /

noun

1. civil engineering a large hand-operated auger used for loose soils

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Other Word Forms

Noun Inflected Forms

• misers
  plural

Etymology

Origin of miser

1535–45; < Latin: wretched

Explanation

A miser is someone who hoards his or her own wealth and doesn’t share or spend any of it. If you remember the old saying “You can’t take it with you!” — then you won't end up acting stingy like a miser. The most famous fictional miser is probably Scrooge in Dickens’s A Christmas Carol. The image of his shivering with cold while he counts his coins illustrates the misery often associated with misers. To be a miser, your impulse to hoard means you won’t even indulge yourself by spending money for fear of depleting your stash.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

miser misers

“I’m a miser right now when it comes to what I’m spending at supermarkets,” he said.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Oct. 15, 2025

A new four-episode podcast aims to show how Ebenezer Scrooge became the miserable miser of the Charles Dickens’ classic “A Christmas Carol,” focusing on themes of redemption, mercy, grace and compassion.

From Washington Times ● Nov. 27, 2023

The Tibetan word for them, "miser", has been translated as both "serfs" and "subjects".

From BBC ● Apr. 20, 2023

The British author’s novella about a selfish and stingy miser who becomes woke in Victorian England was an instant holiday hit when published in 1843.

From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 9, 2022

But she loved Coraline as a miser loves money, or a dragon loves its gold.

From "Coraline" by Neil Gaiman

Jon Clinch has revived the life behind the famous ghost in a prequel that fleshes out the early relationship between the two old misers in “A Christmas Carol.”

From Washington Post ● Oct. 22, 2019

How do we prepare them for a world where people are proud to be stupid misers who adhere to no moral code?

From Salon ● Jan. 28, 2017

When Geronte abruptly decides, as cranky old misers will, to leave his money to two distant relatives, Crispin dresses up like each, in turn, and portrays them as craven, insincere opportunists.

From Los Angeles Times ● Jun. 25, 2015

Bellow observed that the Soviet leader’s comic style seemed to have been adapted from the “provincial autocrats, creeps, misers, officials, gluttons, gamblers and drunkards” in Gogol’s “Dead Souls.”

From New York Times ● Mar. 23, 2015

Poverty is indeed a good protective against it, but 'tis not thereby cured, for I saw beggars that revelled and rich misers that starved.

From The Adventurous Simplicissimus being the description of the Life of a Strange vagabond named Melchior Sternfels von Fuchshaim by Hans Jacob Christoph von Grimmelshausen